By Charles Tembo
NICKSON Chilangwa does not understand what it means to be secretary general for a party and he will take the PF into total oblivion, says Johnson Mpundu.
He says the PF is now dead and buried adding that Chilangwa is acting like a lost child who just wants to eat chicken bones.
Mpundu, a PF founder member, says the party cannot afford to boycott public functions if they are in the process of rebranding.
Over the weekend, the PF held its central committee meeting which was chaired by acting president Given Lubinda.
Announcing that meeting’s resolution, Chilangwa who is acting PF secretary general said the former ruling party would not participate in both the International Women’s Day and the Youth Day celebrations.
“The Patriotic Front wishes to reiterate that it extols the commemoration of all national holidays and national events as demonstrated by the importance we attached to these holidays and events throughout our 10 years in office. Youth Day which falls on the 12th of March each year is an important holiday that highlights the importance of the youth to the country on the anniversary of the disturbances in 1962 that resulted in the deaths of young Zambians during the nation’s turbulent journey to independence. Equally the International Women’s Day which falls on March 8th is a special day that is normally used to celebrate women and to also highlight some of the challenges that our womenfolk face. The day can also be used to craft ways to promote gender equality in a bid to create a fair and just society devoid of gender bias,” said Chilangwa.
“It is therefore sad to note that barely six months after assuming office, the UPND is driving Zambia back to the very evils that we fought against, 58 years ago during the struggle for independence. The UPND regime is fast eroding the gains we had achieved as a nation to ensure enhanced participation and equal opportunity for our women and youths in all facets of our social, political and economic life of our country. The UPND has completely ignored our youths and women and have relegated them to the tail-end of the social, political and economic strata. President Hakainde Hichilema has systematically excluded our women and youths from critical governance issues by deliberately sidelining them as far as appointments to key government positions is concerned. For the reasons highlighted above, I wish to announce to the nation that as Patriotic Front we will not take part in marching or any government planned activities on Women’s and Youth days respectively; instead we will use these days to galvanise our women and youths across the country to do community service in their various localities.”
But Mpundu has told The Mast that Chilangwa is acting like a lost child who just wants to eat chicken bones.
“This guy can surprise you at times. Does he even understand what it means to be SG (secretary general) for a party like PF? This guy just wants to put the PF in total oblivion. And that is the direction the PF under his acting capacity as SG is going,” he said. “The PF is now dead and buried. Zambians should start looking for other alternative opposition parties to offer checks and balances not from the PF.”
Mpundu said the PF should have used public functions to check its relevance to the Zambian people.
“When you are rebranding, you don’t stay away from public functions. That is an opportunity to be seen to the people and measure if people still want you or not. This is an opportunity where you also measure and hear from the people the actual mistakes that you made,” he said.
Mpundu said the decision by Chilangwa to completely dissolve the Kennedy Kamba-led Lusaka provincial executive means the end of PF in Lusaka.
“On that one, it is the end. Kamba was and is a factor in PF for Lusaka Province. But to put the blame on him over the loss of PF is completely unacceptable. Why has he not dissolved the Copperbelt executive which only has three MPs out of the 22? We lost terribly on the Copperbelt than we did in Lusaka. So why has he not dissolved the Copperbelt executive? This is why I say Chilangwa does not mean well for the party,” said Mpundu.