Don’t Be Threatened, NDC Tells Members
EASTERN Province National Democratic Congress chairperson Samuel Lugomo-Phiri has appealed to party members in the province not to feel threatened as they meet. He said in an interview that party members should always work with law enforcers whenever they were attacked by the PF.
“Let them not be intimidated and possibly fear that when the PF organises itself to disperse them, they should always work with the law enforcers by informing them…Our interest is to safeguard the masses who have been thrown in disarray by the PF by displacing them even in their own homes,” Phiri said.
He said his party’s agenda was to bring back peoples’ dignity that had been destroyed by the PF.
“Within a short period of time, the PF has thrown the Zambian people into misery. I call it misery because there is total confusion in the country because a lot of things are not in place. Agriculture being our mine, they have destroyed it completely; the e-voucher system which they were saying would improve the agriculture sector had been a lip service. The e-voucher which they said would increase this year
has failed,” Phiri said.
He said there was nothing that a farmer could do with the inputs which they were currently getting because time for applying fertilizer was over.
“You know the crops have been destroyed while others are not looking good because they lacked fertilizer. This time around, that’s when they say ‘a caring government is now giving fertilizer’. What type of government is that? Agriculture is the major source of income in the province but the government has completely destroyed it and thrown the people into misery,” Phiri said.
He said it was unfortunate that some farmers who sold their maize to Food Reserve Agency last year had not yet been paid.
Phiri also wondered why the government removed street vendors without looking at an alternative trading place.
“Why are they chasing people without giving them an alternative trading place? They found hawkers selling shoes and different things in town, they send police to beat them up…one boy at Devil Street was brutally battered by the police officers just for selling belts. What kind of government is this? Do they have a heart for the people?”
asked Phiri.
As part of the Cholera prevention measure, the government has removed street vendors and allocated them trading places in markets.
About 17 people were arrested by a combined team of security personnel in Chipata for vending.
Some vendors were tear gassed for being uncompromising during the operation.
And Sinda District NDC chairperson James Banda commonly known as Mfuti says President Edgar Lungu’s leadership was full of weakness which allowed the people to lose trust in the PF government.
“The leadership of president Edgar Lungu is full of weaknesses because they make laws but later remove them because they feel they can’t follow them and by so doing, it’s indicative that the PF government has no direction,”
Banda said.
“They have failed to provide quality education; they have failed to provide farming inputs to farmers; their poor agriculture marketing are signs and symptoms of the PF government governance failures.”
He boasted that NDC was capable party of dealing with PF as it knew the weak points of the ruling party. Banda added that NDC would show its strength by winning the Chiwuyu ward by election where they have fielded Samson Mwale.
“We are ready to challenge the PF in Chiwuyu by election because we have chosen Simon Mwale to contest on NDC ticket and our win there will tell the Patriotic Front that NDC is not here to play. We are determined to win because we are capable as we are the only party that knows the PF government inside out,”
claimed Banda.
“We are moving in the right direction because we have a lot of civil servants who are supporting us and this encourages us to work flat out in selling our party. Even though at the moment they don’t come out openly, but their support is such an encouragement to us because this simply means they are seeing certain weakness in their parent, the Patriotic Front government.”
The Chiwuyu by-election comes after the death of Patriotic Front councillor Patrick Zulu who passed on last month.
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