IT’S inappropriate and unbefitting of Edgar Lungu to use abusive and insulting language against fellow citizens who have given him the opportunity to be President, says Jack Kalala.
Reacting to President Lungu’s recent branding of his critics as fools, Kalala said being President did not mean he was better than other citizens and had the right to disrespect them.
Kalala, a former special assistant of late president Levy Mwanawasa for project monitoring and implementation, said to the contrary, President Lungu should feel indebted to all citizens for the privilege and honour to lead them.
Commissioning the Arcades Flyover last Friday, President Lunch said when he was in Luapula Province he heard a slogan “PF ilebomba, utupuba tuletalika (PF is working while fools are disputing the works)”.
“Ifintu filecinja, utupuba tuletalika, translated, this simply means that Zambians should be told that when PF is working, I don’t know whether the word is foolish people or idiots, I don’t know…but people who are dull in mind are arguing that nothing is being done. I remember in Parliament debating the word foolish, stupid idiot and all those things but I don’t want to go there but all in all they are saying Ifwe tulebomba, utupuba tuletalika,” said the President.
But Kalala said it was being ignoble and unbecoming of President Lungu to use vulgar language against fellow citizens who do not agree with him.
“It is lacking of decorum, decency and dignity. President Lungu has indeed grown bigheaded and contemptuous of others. He has developed audacious impunity and arrogance to say anything injurious to others because of the relative immunity he enjoys as President. This is totally wrong and irresponsible. As President he should conduct himself with respectability, honour and dignity,” Kalala said.
He recalled that President Lungu boasted of constructing flyovers which he said were actually ‘humps’ made of heaped and compacted soil and laterite embellished with concrete pavers.
“Is that really development that a Republican President should boast about as development? Isn’t this work of the mayor? Mr Sata did the first such humps when he was governor of Lusaka,” Kalala said. “Assuming that these humps are a mark of economic development, what positive changes have they made in the lives of the people living in the surrounding areas and Zambians in general? Has their living standard become better than before the construction of the humps?”
Kalala wondered what economic value the ‘humps’ being constructed had.
“How much revenue will they generate for the treasury to buy medicines for the hospitals? In fact, they are just a burden on the lives of the people, as they will be required to pay back the debts for many years to come,” he said.
Kalala further said President Lungu’s boasting that the country had built beautiful cities and sites goes to show how much he was detached from reality and the derelict state of affairs obtaining in the country.
He said the Head of State was oblivious to the deplorable and awful environment that citizens were condemned to in the compounds.
“He is oblivious of the dreadful conditions that Zambians are living in and the hardships they are enduring to barely survive. The compounds are unplanned and lack sanitary facilities; they drink water mixed with human faecal matter; they live in ramshackle and dilapidated houses without adequate ventilations; there are no proper streets or roads. People live in pathetic conditions that President Lungu is not aware of because he lives in his own fantasy world,” Kalala said.
He said it was shocking and regrettable that President Lungu could afford to boast and be proud of the high levels of unjustifiable debts his government had contracted with which “so little has been achieved.
He said a responsible leader would be seriously concerned given that the economically stressed people would have to pay that debt for many years to come.
“He is not even ashamed that his government is even struggling to default service the loans. It is a shameful and embarrassing situation for a country to find itself in. It also reflects badly on the leadership as lacking responsibility and competence to manage national affairs,” Kalala said. “President Lungu claimed that he was transforming the country but what change has he created in the lives of citizens? Is this transformation only visible to President Lungu when unemployment levels are high, exchange rates are high, the inflation is at double digit, the economy is in recession at – 4.5 per cent, endless long hours of load-shedding, party cadres’ lawlessness and brutality, rampant corruption, tribalism, among the many other numerous problems that this regime has created and failed to resolve?”
He said President Lungu should know that he had lamentably failed and the best Zambians should do is to vote him out.
“Zambians owe him nothing. In fact, it would be more appropriate to even resign in national interest,” said Kalala.