By Speedwell Mupuchi
DR Sketchly Sacika says the Patriotic Front was a criminal enterprise on the scale of the mafia.
And Dr Sacika says Fred M’membe’s Socialist Party and Harry Kalaba’s Democratic Party held the future of opposition political parties in Zambia and never the Patriotic Front.
Dr Sacika served as secretary to cabinet under UNIP.
He phoned The Mast to express concern over PF vice-president Given Lubinda’s recent comments on the outcome of the August 12 general elections that favoured Hakainde Hichilema and the UPND to form government.
Dr Sacika said Lubinda risks devaluing himself as a politician if he continued making statements claiming that President Hichilema and the UPND won elections through falsehoods.
“I think this is not the way for him. The social psychology of elections is simple. The elections are won by men and women chiefly because most people vote against somebody rather than for somebody. There is a difference,” he said. “The elections on 12th August had nothing to do with party manifestos or election promises. They were a referendum on the performance of the PF in government and the people delivered their verdict by voting against president Edgar Lungu and the Patriotic Front because they wanted to get rid of an incompetent, corrupt, divisive and sectarian government.”
Dr Sacika said President Hichilema and the UPND were merely beneficiaries of an electoral backlash against Lungu and the PF.
“The Patriotic Front government was a criminal enterprise on the scale of the mafia and its existence was purely for the benefit of the PF itself and its supporters and hoodlums masquerading as political cadres,” he said.
Dr Sacika said Lungu’s statement of ubomba mwi bala alya mwi bala underscored the corrupt, lawlessness and criminal nature of the PF government and people could not stand it.
He said the talk of rebranding the PF was like the mafia saying they would improve their public image while retaining its character as a criminal enterprise.
“This is what they are trying to do. The best the PF can do is to apologise to the people of Zambia unreservedly for subjecting them to such misrule,” Dr Sacika said. “As regards the future, it is a toll order for the PF to bounce back to power after such a disastrous performance. The future for opposition political parties as far as I can see is for Harry Kalaba’s Democratic Party, Fred M’membe’s Socialist Party. That is the future, not for PF, it is finished.”
He said in the absence of founder leader Michael Sata, there was nothing holding the Patriotic Front together.
“So I cannot see it survive,” he said.
Dr Sacika said Zambians had the right to know the extent of the damage to the country by PF’s misrule and how it was possible for such misrule to occur.
He said the new dawn government should consider setting up a truth commission to investigate the transgressions and recommend remedial actions so that Zambians do not have to go through the kind of life they went through under PF.
“If we don’t deal with the mistakes and wrongdoings of the past, we shall never make progress,” said Dr Sacika.