By Kombe Mataka
UPND is damaging our integrity through its purported fight against corruption, says Bowman Lusambo.
And Lusambo says MMD leader Nevers Mumba’s insistence that the ministers who served under the PF regime must account for their deeds while in office is a scheme for him to get a job from UPND.
“We do not award contracts. My job was ceremonial. You go to open [commission] toilets. You go to inspect fields and rescuing people from floods in Kanyama and Kuku compound,” the former Lusaka Province minister in Edgar Lungu’s government said.
Lusambo said the fight against corrupt was tarnishing the names of former ministers like him when his role in government was merely ceremonial.
“Mr (Michael) Sata was not brutal, he allowed us [MMD] to offer checks and balances. Mr Sata would speak in the morning and I would respond in the afternoon. The only thing which was there was the clash with Mr Sata’s cadres in City Market where a gun was pointed to my head,” he said. “The brutality we are seeing is taking Bowman Lusambo and other former ministers to the ACC (Anti-Corruption Commission) on allegations that I own 49 houses. This is brutal because they are playing with our integrity. They are tarnishing our names. We are arrested today and being made to stay in suspense as we wait to be taken to court.”
Lusambo said people should be investigated and prosecuted while in office.
“What authority can Bowman use in Lusaka as provincial minister? What programmes were in Lusaka Province, which Bowman had authority over? From cleaning garbage, are you telling me there are any advantages? We do not award contracts,” he said. “My job was ceremonial. You go to open [commission] toilets. You go to inspect fields and rescuing people from floods in Kanyama and Kuku compound.”
And Lusambo said UPND ministers should also realise that their time to account would come.
“I have sat with my colleagues in the UPND. I have told them ‘now you have entered government, next day, they will call you criminals as we are being called now’,” he said.
Lusambo said the fight against corruption would make President Hichilema unpopular.
“We have gone through this. Do you know why Mr Sata stopped the fight against corruption? His popularity was going down. Even him [President Hichilema] his popularity has dropped. He came at 90 per cent. President Hakainde is now operating at 50 per cent today,” Lusambo claimed.
And Lusambo charged that Mumba wants a job from President Hichilema.
He was reacting to Mumba’s comments when he joined the UPND campaign team ahead of the forthcoming Kabwata parliamentary by-election that PF should not complain that UPND was fighting to destroy it.
Mumba also said the PF’s sentence was life imprisonment.
But Lusambo said Mumba should stop using the UPND to advance his personal ambitions.
“Ba Nevers Mumba ni ba chancer fye. Balekeni balelanda, balefwaya incito. Kaili ba Nevers Mumba ba sungu, balibelela ukwikala ku America (Mumba is just a chancer. Let him continue talking, he wants a job. And Nevers Mumba is used to living in luxury),” he said in an interview. “I know him. When you see Dr Mumba speaking like that, just know nabapya abakamba, bali nensala (the old man is broke, he is hungry). They want to find a place where they can get some food.”
Lusambo wondered why Mumba was asking the UPND to continue persecuting former ministers when he was a victim of similar circumstances under the PF government.