KENNEDY Kamba has advised PF member Kelvin Bwalya Fube to form a political party of his own and prove his popularity.
On Friday, Fube described the PF party election process as undemocratic and a sham as the central committee’s mandate expired in 2016.
In a statement live on Diamond TV, Fube also said the surrogates nominated and appointed by President Edgar Lungu were the same ones that endorsed him as sole candidate at the PF convention that took place yesterday.
President Lungu filed his nomination for PF president on Wednesday and the party declared him unopposed.
But Fube said in the past few days, he and his team had been inundated with messages and calls as to whether he would file his nominations for PF president at the convention.
“I maintain that my elder brother the President Edgar Chagwa Lungu is not eligible to stand as President and as a lawyer he knows this. He has held the office of President twice having been elected two times. There is no third term in our constitution, the Republican Constitution,” said Fube. “The President, by filing his nomination has set in motion his first steps in his attempt to defy the Republican Constitution…. In 2014, we elected Edgar Chagwa Lungu as party president. He therefore stood in 2015 as our President and stood again in 2016 as our candidate. He can’t stand again…. The central committee was formally elected in 2011. Their mandate came to an end in 2016. We should have held that extraordinary conference to mandate the central committee to do what they are purporting to do now.”
He said very soon a very big signal would be given to PF members and they should be ready to change the game and some players.
Responding to Fube, Kamba, the Lusaka Province PF chairman and member of the party’s central committee, accused him of misleading the nation.
“These attempts by Mr Fube to try and mislead Zambians won’t help him in anyway in his attempts to cause confusion in the PF and further sway the minds of the people into believing his unsubstantiated claims,” he said.
“The best Kelvin Bwalya Fube can do is to move on with life, his law practice and maybe try to form a political party or join the existing ones and become opposition party president because he is not even part of the PF. The question is what is he fearing? If he has the numbers, let him form or join a political party and become party president and we will meet him on the ground. Otherwise, he has turned himself into a political joker full of rhetoric.”
He insisted that the PF would not turn back on fielding President Lungu as its presidential candidate in this year’s general election.
“We are not turning back on the issue of President Lungu and his eligibility. This is a closed chapter and President Lungu is our candidate and will be on the ballot on the PF ticket, come August. This country is a democracy and KBF has a right to form or join any political party of his choice since he is not part of us in the PF,” he added.
“The 2021 bid is the second term for President Lungu and not the third term as maliciously claimed by KBF. We warm KBF to stop issuing incorrect statements because they are embarrassing themselves. The law has provisions that will allow us to take action against them if this continues. President Lungu will be on the ballot come August. KBF must stop misleading the nation forthwith.”
And Kamba dismissed Fube’s disclosure that some people were positioned at the PF secretariat to attack him if he had gone to file in his papers for the PF presidency.
“Our advice to KBF is that he risks being categorised as a political joker if he continues to appear on social media with no tangible or traceable political muscle on the ground. President Lungu is a lawyer like him, who has constitutional consciousness and respects the rule of law. President Lungu has not abrogated any law,” said Kamba.
“Mr Fube has further claimed that people were positioned to harm him if he attempted to file in nomination papers yesterday and that the Secretary General was not at the secretariat. These are unsubstantiated and unfounded allegations that must be trashed. All these things will not help KBF to win the hearts of Zambians.”