KBN TV EDITORIAL – DISORGANIZED, SELFISH OPPOSITION, A HUGE LETDOWN TO ZAMBIAN VOTERS
When you wake up to a video of a self proclaimed praise singer like Chela Tukuta (whether new or old video) complaining about how things have become bad, you must know that even UPND cadres can’t take it anymore.
Those who want to sing the loudest are just pretending but when they get back home, they are facing an empty fridge, perpetual darkness, empty fuel tank, and perhaps sleeping hungry because they can’t afford to buy a bag of mealie meal at over K400.
What Tukuta has shown in his video which has gone viral is that people are willing to support this administration but the failures are too glaring to be masked.
On Monday, the Socialist party leader, Dr. Fred M’membe, made an audacious announcement on one of the local radio stations that the UPND can’t win next year’s elections based on widespread discontentment.
He has traversed the country and has made his own assessment which should not be dismissed as mere politicking. Dr. M’membe may not be the first or last one to predict the fall of UPND from grace.
As Tukuta said, the “drunkard” left fuel at K17, mealie meal at K130, and the list goes on and yet Zambians kicked him out. Today, how much is fuel, mealie meal, sugar, cooking oil? During the UPND in power, the cost of living has escalated from roughly K5,000 to K11,000 for a family of six on a monthly basis, according to the JCTR.
In the midst of such economic malaise and desperate frustration, Zambians are faced with a very disorganized and selfish opposition that is failing to inspire hope in the nation.
The opposition deserve a public rebuke for their collective failure to put aside personal interests and for letting down hopeless voters with no alternative leadership to look at.
In case the opposition are still basking in self deception, the ECZ yesterday certified and publicised the new voter’s register with 7,073,513 voters. What does that tell you, time is up!
When you hear the Civil Service Commission Chairperson Choolwe Beyani questioning the validity of the 2022 Population and Housing Census report by the Zambia Statistics Agency (ZAMSTATS), calling the findings illegal and declaring them null and void null, you must begin to ask questions.
What population figures did Mr. Beyani expect? Why is he becoming jittery over official figures? Is there something he knows that we should know? Who gave him the authority to question the work of a professional body such as ZAMSTATS?
In trying to understand the motivation for Mr. Beyani’s protest, we can only say, your guess is as good as ours.
If we were to extend Tukuta’s lamentations, things are so bad that even the National Assembly is in protest mode. They are not concentrating on their work because we understand this Government is struggling to fund gratuity for Members of Parliament since August last year.
So when you think they are walking away from debating the high cost of living, they could as well be walking away in protest for not receiving allowances and gratuity due to them.
Today, Lusaka is a sorry flood disaster site, yet the Government is quiet and it’s business as usual. Even the planned visit to the Chaisa flood victims by the Vice President Mutale Nalumango, has been postponed. They’re just floods, they are not a disaster. Meanwhile in KANYAMA yesterday, Police retrieved the body of an unidentified male found floating in the floods.
The compound has had no power for over 5 days because ZESCO has switched off supply to try and prevent electrocution accidents because of flooding in homes.
Clearly Zambians are in pain at every level and based on Dr. M’membe’s assessment, if the UPND were to win, you can’t blame them. It’s not because voters are happy with their dismal performance, it’s because of voter apathy.
Voters would rather stay away from voting because opposition parties are proving to be no different from the UPND administration. They are all without exception just interested in nothing else but to become President of Zambia. Where are the solutions? Where is the message of hope?
At the rate things are going, there will be individual presidential candidates for each political party on the ballot and not a single opposition candidate. Tonse, UKA, Zambia We Want must rethink their priorities and realize that the Zambian people are looking up to them.
We challenge opposition leaders to prove to the voters that they are not just desperate job seekers who can’t stand the thought of another person winning the Presidency other than themselves!