When in govt you cannot be perfect – Kambwili
By Fanny Kalonda
PF presidential hopeful Chishimba Kambwili has asked government to take responsibility for the high cost of living in the country.
He argues that “when you are in government you cannot be perfect, there are certain things that you perceive that you have done very well and yet the general populace is saying this is not right”.
Kambwili also notes that “this country can develop but those in government have not showed us any signs of wanting to develop this country. In any case, they are just in government for their own personal gain”.
“If government wants to blame other people for the cost of living, they are being unfair. Today we are grappling with the cost of living because of the IMF conditionalities. Government today wants to boast that PF failed to conclude the IMF deal,” he said.
“If people complain, by the way the people are the voters, the people are the masters, if you don’t listen to the people just know that you are digging your own political grave. If they feel that you are not listening to their advice, you are not listening to their complaints, they will come and speak in the ballot. And when they speak in the ballot, the results are not good. Winning by-elections in a ward and sometimes in a constituency, it’s who has the money because right now people are suffering.”
Kambwili, when he featured on Prime TV’s Oxygen of Democracy on Monday, said “right now people are suffering.”
“And people realise that even if you vote out the ruling party in a by-election, you will not change anything. After all they still remain the ruling government and be making the rules and usually people who go and vote in by-elections bakonkafye ukulya (they’re following food). Those who give them money are the ones that they will prefer to vote for,” he said. “If there is apathy in a by-election, that is vote of no confidence on the government in power. Look at the numbers that participated in the 2021 general elections and look at the numbers that are participating in the by-elections now. It shows you that the people have declared a vote of no confidence in the UPND administration.”
Kambwili said people that defend everything the government does are misleading leaders.
“The problem we have in Zambia is the so-called praise singers and the so-called unreasonable citizens. This country will never develop if we have this attitude and wrong notion that once a party loses elections, then they can never come back to governance and that they should be irrelevant to the political dispensation of this country. That’s where we have a problem particularly in Zambia. There are other mistakes because obviously when you are in government you cannot be perfect, there are certain things that you perceive that you have done very well and yet the general populace is saying this is not right. And I appreciate president Edgar Lungu when he had Brebner Changala, when he visited him, the president came out and said sometimes as president ‘you may not know what is even obtaining on the lower levels. Sometimes you are misled as president’. Those are wise words of a leader who has been in government, who has realised [that] indeed these things do happen,” he said. “And for those who are in government when you are given such kind of advice it’s only good to accept that advise and make use of it. But I’m so shocked that our colleagues in government today started castigating president Edgar Lungu. Oh if you were misled, leave out HH. HH is not mislead. Ba HH ndemyeba (I am telling you) those who are saying that do not love you. The people that want to benefit from his leadership, they are misleading him. That advice from former president Edgar Lungu is very good advice. It’s people even when they know that a certain action is not correct, they just want to advise those in government that you are doing very well. Probably because they are members of that political party or probably because they benefit in one way or another. Those are the people that mislead governments.”
And Kambwili said the government has not showed any signs of wanting to develop the country.
“If Zambia was behaving the way they behave in the Western world in terms of criticising what is wrong, we could have developed better. But in this country, if I am a member of PF and they say ba PF you are making a mistake, even if you know and you are convinced beyond reasonable doubt that what the people are saying is correct, you just want to defend. You are misleading your leaders,” he said. “This country can develop but those in government have not showed us any signs of wanting to develop this country. In any case, they are just in government for their own personal gain.”
Meanwhile, Kambwili said the PF presidency is not yet vacant because the party president has not yet handed over his seat to someone new.
“Strictly speaking, and I will say this without reservation, the PF presidency in principle is not yet vacant because the party president who is outgoing has not yet handed over the mantle to the president at the general conference. So president Lungu has taken a back seat, he is now a statesman. But he has not handed over the leadership of the party as he can only hand over to somebody who is elected at the general conference,” said Kambwili. “If we try to show any element of being divided, it will have a very bad effect on our general membership. So what we are working on now is to build the party and unity in the party. We cannot go to the convention if we are not united. He who wants to lead must prepare to be led.”