Hichilema and his corrupt ministers 

By Daily Revelation Editor

All People’s Congress party leader Nason Msoni is asserting that President Hakainde Hichilema is a kingpin of corruption for failing to fire corrupt ministers in his government.

We are very sure that Hichilema knows the thieves in his government who the Anti-Corruption Commission  (ACC) is fearing to announce that they are investigating, since they have the protection of the President.

The fact that he knows but he has chosen to condone the corrupt ministers is indicative that his so-called fight against corruption is nothing but usual political hogwash, as usual aimed at pleasing simple minds. One can fool some little minds here and there, but those who are discerning have already come to the conclusion that the man simply isn’t capable of fighting corruption. As usual with Hichilema, his pronouncements do not tally with his actions. He always promises heaven in most cases but in most cases he even struggles to deliver hell. There is a complete breakdown between what he says and what he does. And therein lies ones character.

Character is mainly defined as the sum of what comes out of an individual, what they are capable of doing, rather than what they say. When Hichilema got elected and pronounced that he was committed to fighting corruption, we all thought that finally an angel had come who was going to take on the vice head on. Zambians did not anticipate that Hichilema was going to become the high-priest of corruption presiding over a cabinet that has most of its members tainted with dirty hands.

But we should have seen the signs from the gate go that the pronouncements on fighting corruption were mere bluffs, that he was just being another of these shameless politicians who parrot things they can never even live up to. The fact that his ministers and other public officials got their hands sticky early on despite his many pronouncements is very telling indeed. We are sure that as people who know him very well, they even laugh their lungs out every time he regurgitates about fighting corruption, as these are people who have associated with him over a longer period and know him inside out very well.

The fear by the ACC to name the corrupt officials in his administration must actually be blamed squarely on Hichilema, especially that the commission is under his arms at State House. All these years the ACC and other investigating agencies have failed to move in on his corrupt officials, Hichilema should be made answerable for that.

It just doesn’t make sense. How do you claim to fight corruption when everyday you are interacting with the corrupt people? Why does Hichilema want to risk his presidency, knowing how angrily Zambians react to corruption, by protecting the thieves? Is he failing to act probably because he fears the ripple effect the dropping of any of these thieves would have on him personally? Does he know so much that he can’t even dare raise a finger against anyone of them? Is he scared of fulfilling a famous Bible scripture that says if you want to remove a log in another man’s eye, you must first start by removing the log in your own eye?

Those who are wise enough already know that the so-called fight against corruption will yield nothing. And this is our President who is always referring to those in the previous administration as thieves. According to Hichilema, the definition of corruption in his mind revolves around specifically the seven years of his predecessor Edgar Lungu.

It is so heart wrenching for the millions of Zambians who punished Lungu at the ballot in 2021 over what they viewed as the rampant corruption that was taking place under his administration, and thought that in Hichilema, the country finally had someone to fix the problem in the mould of “Bally will fix it.” 

If he is not involved in shielding his ministers we urge him to issue a public statement challenging the ACC which is under his authority to name the corrupt ministers he seems to be shielding, and thereafter immediately ask them to step aside until the investigations against them have been finalised and cleared. And these fast-track courts he has established will actually come in handy to assist him get his ministers back quickly into office in case they are cleared. You don’t set up fast-track courts for the sole purpose of pursuing your immediate enemies.