By Munir Zulu
UPND IS FACTORY OF TRIBALISM
*MINORITY AND MAJORITY*
• According to Central Statistics Office Census report of 2010 –which is the last report conducted on Zambia’s population so far – among the 13 million people there were 72 tribes.
• According to the census report, Bemba was the most populous tribal community forming 21 per cent of the total population, followed by Tonga, who formed 13.6 per cent of the total population. Chokwe were the smallest community forming 0.5 per cent of the total population. These statistics, clearly, answer the question of minority and majority.
*THE BIRTH OF TRIBALISM IN ZAMBIAN POLITICS*
• Before the coming of Hakainde Hichilema on the political scene, the word tribalism was mere a theory that was never practical.
• In 2006, after UPND founder leader Anderson Mazoka died, it was Hichilema and his friends who said a Lozi can’t win an election in Zambia. This was how Sakwiba Sikota who was then UPND vice president and legal person to take over Mazoka, was prevented from becoming even a substantive president until a convention, at which they needed to elect a successor.
• Before the post went into liquidation, it once published an editorial titled: “We do not hate HH but we hate his tribalism”
Part of the editorial reads:
“Hakainde has been known to say things like “if we give power to these Bembas, we will never get it back” … Hakainde is the only politician that we can think of in our country whose entry into politics was heralded by a tribal trumpet. After Anderson Mazoka died and the fight to succeed him had started, those who supported Hakainde said he should be given to run the party because he was Tonga. Hakainde has never convincingly, if at all, distanced himself from these statements”
• In 2016 it was late Hon. Daniel Munkombwe. (R.I.P) who spoke at a UPND rally in Southern Province, that it was time for a Tonga to rule. Hichilema spoke immediately after Honorable Munkombwe but never distanced himself from that tribal remarks. Why? Because he is a beneficiary of tribalism. As Fred M’membe used to write in editorials during the Post Newspaper days “You tell who a tribalist is by virtue of his behavior and not what he says”
• In 2016, it was reported in the media that some people in Mazabuka said “only a Tonga can replace Garry Nkombo in Mazabuka Constituency”. HH and his friends in UPND never condemned these tribal remarks. Why? Because tribalism is their blood.
• In 2017, NDC Vice President Saboi Imboela left UPND and revealed what we all know about this party, that, “only if you have a right surname can UPND can be your home”. These are words of a Lozi – a tribe which Hichilema and his friends said in 2006 that, it cannot win an election.
• December 19, 2019, Jonas Shakafuswa – a known UPND senior member wrote an article “ Let us face it. Zambian Politics is defined on tribal lines”. He said:
“Has the Bemba led PF managed resources prudently on behalf of all Zambians? Have the benefits trickled down to the lowest of society? Are the leaders sacrificing for the poorest of the poor? If yes, then I see no reason of not returning PF to power. For me it is also time for the Bembas to ask themselves if the so called leaders representing them in Government are the best reflection of its people”
• This year in another election year Jonas Shakafuswa at it again with another tribal rhetoric where he says “Zambians are tired of serving Northerners and Easterners and that Zambians should claim their peaceful and United country”. HH has never distanced himself from all that. Why? Again, because he is a beneficiary of tribalism.
• One writer Joe Mwansa Lombe Kaluba wrote, on September 15, 2017”
“The problem is that we want to pretend that there is no tribalism in Zambia. People are afraid to say it because they think others will tell them that they are the ones who are being tribal. Regional politics are real and they exist in our country”
• In conclusion, an attempt by UPND agents to accuse me of being tribal is yet another fruitless scheme of self-cleansing from their tribal identity. Clearly, it is not only me who see UPND for what it is – a tribal cult with members who think leadership must exchange tribal hands.
ENDS