DR FRED M’membe has stressed that the current capitalist system in Zambia needs to be uprooted for it is inherently corrupt.
The Socialist Party 2021 presidential candidate also says principally, “we are not against alliances” but that there must be a common agenda being pursued.
He was speaking on a programme dubbed Public Forum on Sun FM radio in Lusaka on Wednesday morning.
Dr M’membe decried capitalism as an inherently corrupt system.
He said if one wanted a peaceful society, a society full of justice and equity, “you’ll just need to uproot this whole system because it’s inherently corrupt, unjust, unfair.”
“Corruption degrades the human being [and] we can’t do a compromise over that. We shouldn’t lose hope and start to improvise. Every capitalist society is corrupt; what differs is just the degree of corruption,” Dr M’membe said. “Even the individuals we are today very critical of a product of this inherently corrupt, rotten system. Garbage in, garbage out; that’s the rule. This country today is inherently corrupt and it is not only the politician who is in government today who is corrupt. No!”
He indicated that today, the family, the Church and the traditional leadership system were all corrupt.
“The entire system is corrupt,” Dr M’membe stressed.
Dr M’membe explained that socialism was about the respect for the sacredness of life.
He said one could not claim to respect the sacredness of life if they did not provide the things that made life sacred.
“You deprive a human being of the things that make his or her life sacred; can you claim to respect the sacredness of life? No! A human being needs dignity – the dignity that comes from having a solid roof over your head. The dignity that comes from having reasonable access to water, the dignity that comes from having reasonable sanitation where you can have the privacy of going to the toilet,” he explained.
“If you respect the sacredness of life, you’ll ensure that there is adequate food supply for every human being on this earth. This is what God wanted us to be; to live in dignity.”
Dr M’membe said under capitalism, a few individuals have taken everything.
“They have literally taken all the land and privatised it. No one ever received a title deed from God that ‘my son or my daughter, you have been very good to me; here is land and it’s yours alone.’ Socialism is about dignified life, it’s about creating a more just, fair, humane society and it’s our collective duty to create such a society,” he noted. “Capitalism does not respect the sacredness of life. It respects profit. This is the system that took human beings as slaves. Transported them as cargo to the Americas!”
He added that capitalism thrived on subjugation.
Dr M’membe pointed out that capitalism corrupted one’s mind.
“[It] unleashes a level of consumerism where products become more important than the sacredness of life. Classical slavery, under capitalism, might have ended. But there is still another form of slavery – the perpetual subjugation and degradation of people,” he said, adding that people ought to struggle for a better world. “The injustice that we are subjecting human beings to today is not very different from the classical slavery. Capitalism cannot survive without exploitation of human beings and nature.”
Dr M’membe also responded to a listener who sent a text message asking about the Socialist Party’s views on political alliances.
“There is so much talk about alliances. Are we against alliances? No! As a matter of principle, we are not against alliances. But alliances must be of people sharing a common aim. There must be a common denominator,” Dr M’membe clarified.
“There must be something that you want to achieve together. [There must be something] that is congruent to all your activities, your beliefs. Those who share common beliefs, aims, programmes should unite and achieve their goals together.”
He continued: “all socialists should come together and pursue a common objective because they have got a common agenda”.
“To say a socialist party should have an alliance with a capitalist party, is trying to mix sugar with salt. They all are tasty things but they don’t go together,” he noted. “There are some people who think all what this country needs is fixing… It’s not easy for the Socialist Party to go into an alliance with people who want to fix things. We are revolutionaries; we are here to change everything upside down.”
Dr M’membe argued that the current society, from a socialist standpoint, was not sustainable.
“It is this same order that they want to fix that is breeding corruption, unemployment, hunger, violence. You can’t fix it!” said Dr M’membe.