LET’S BITE THE BULLET AND FIND ANOTHER CANDIDATE, PANJI URGES PF…we risk finding ourselves without a candidate
By Patson Chilemba
PF is burying its head in the sand by dismissing State Counsel John Sangwa’s threat to challenge President Edgar Lungu’s nomination, says ruling party member Colonel Panji Kaunda.
Speaking with Daily Revelation, Col Panji urged the PF to take John Sangwa’s threat seriously, saying rather than dismissing him, they should be putting place internal mechanisms on how they will navigate the matter once it is brought up before the courts.
“Our party is burying its head in the sand. If people go ahead to field President Lungu, and if we will have no candidate, what will we do? We have a decision to make, do we continue with President Lungu as our candidate? Do we bite the bullet for the sake of Zambians and the party and find a new candidate?” Col Panji asked.
On government chief whip Tutwa Ngulube’s statement that Sangwa was not a presidential candidate to be challenging the President’s candidature, Col Panji said there was nowhere in the constitution where it said that citizens could not challenge the presidency. He said for Sangwa to continue insisting on something meant that he knew where he stood as a lawyer, just as Ngulube himself was also a lawyer.
Col Panji said he was elated on the failure of bill 10 to pass, saying it contained several harmful clauses which were going to destroy the country’s democracy.
And Col Panji said Zambians must sue the Electoral Commission of Zambia (ECZ) should millions of eligible Zambians be disenfranchised from voting in the 2021 general elections, wondering why they did away with the old voters register. He said it was not possible to capture the nine million new voters within a period of one month, as it took three months to capture six million voters the last time out.
He said in villages like Vubwi, where he was, there was scanty information on the ongoing voters register, just like in many places of the country.