BUYOYA DIDN’T INTERVIEW TWO CANDIDATES, HE INTERVIEWED INTELLIGENCE AND IGNORANCE
By Chadrin Nseemani
This is why I say President Hakainde Hichilema is intelligent. I watched both interviews by Dingindaba Jonah Buyoya , back to back, and the contrast is painful. On one side you have Brian Mundubile, lawyer, Mporokoso past MP, Tonse Alliance candidate elected on 28 January 2026, shouting about second independence and love for Zambians. On the other side you have Hichilema, calm, with numbers off his head, explaining a country like a man who has actually run it.
Buyoya asked both men the same thing, the cost of living. Mundubile’s answer was politics. He said money is always there, it is a question of priorities. He said inflation is just statistics. When asked where he will find money for industrialization, he said we will sit down with mining houses because copper is now $9,500 when it was $6,000 under his government. That is not a plan, that is a threat to investors.
Hichilema’s answer was economics. He said you cannot talk about cost without talking about where we started. We inherited minus 2.8% GDP growth, a defaulted economy, in debt distress. That is a fact. In 2020 Zambia was contracting, we could not pay our debts. Today debt restructuring is saving $1.9 billion every single year. That money is not going to Eurobond holders anymore, it is going into the economy. That is what he calls moving from consumption to investment.
Buyoya challenged both on mealie meal, and this is where intelligence showed. Mundubile said the food basket is K12,000 and that is it, people are suffering, therefore government has failed.
Hichilema said that is nominal thinking, and economics is measured in real terms. He said yes, the basket is high because we added 24% inflation in 2021, plus 15%, plus 12%, and now 6.5% in July 2026. You cannot erase that history with a slogan. But he pointed to what matters, supply.
He further said Zambia has produced five million tons of maize this year, the highest since independence, after the worst drought in living memory. That is why food inflation is now 6.4%, down from 6.7% in June, and why the price of mealie meal is finally coming down from K300 to K240 in some areas. That is context.
Mundubile does not know the difference between price level and inflation rate. He thinks 6.5% should mean cheap mealie meal tomorrow. Hichilema knows 6.5% means we have stopped the bleeding that PF caused. Mundubile got one number right by accident and built a rally around it. Hichilema built the 6.5% after four years of debt talks, Kwacha stabilization, and a bumper harvest. One is reading the figure, the other is the reason the figure exists.
Buyoya asked about crowds. Mundubile thinks crowds mean he is winning. Hichilema said he is proud to have competition, that democracy needs it. That is maturity. When asked about youth unemployment, Mundubile said he will put youths from the margins to the centre. Hichilema said we have employed 45,000 teachers and 20,000 health workers, plus army and other sectors, all youth, in four years and ten months. One gives you a phrase, the other gives you a payroll.
This election in August 2026 is not between two politicians. It is between noise and knowledge. One candidate thinks love for Zambia is enough to run Zambia. The other knows the difference between nominal and real, between a rally and a reserve, between borrowing and investing.
By Chadrin Nseemani
Actually, this years elections will reveal the intelligence of Zambians and their resolve to move the country forward.