By Staff Reporter
Bowman Lusambo says he feels pity for Hakainde Hichilema and has urged him and his administration to resign for “miserably failing” Zambians, so that “by far the most popular” Edgar Lungu can take over.
Speaking with Daily Revelation on the challenge from State House to name who would take over if President Hichilema were to resign, following calls from opposition figures for him to do so after occasioning the shortages and skyrocketing of mealie meal prices, high fuel prices, high cost of living and the general lack of liquidity in the economy, Lusambo said Lungu was readily available take over from Hichilema and improve the situation in the country.
He said the PF worked extremely hard to secure strategic reserves for the country in maize and had managed to end load shedding as well as ensuring that fuel prices were manageable at K17 per liter as opposed to the over K26 they were going at now, but that President Hichilema had destroyed all that in just one year and some months.
He said Zambians did not expect that they would be in this situation right now where they are having to import mealie meal from abroad, owing to the “reckless” exports of the commodity by the UPND administration where even talk of GMO food is being entertained to the detriment of people’s health.
Addressing State House chief communications specialist Clayson Hamasaka and also PF founder member Charity Banda’s statement that the person she is supporting Chishimba Kambwili must cede the presidency to Lungu, Lusambo said he would have expected that President Hichilema would have already called a press conference to announce his resignation for messing up.
He also said the PF needed a person who will win the party an election.
“Edgar Lungu is there. Bowman is there. We have a lot of people that can take over. Joe Malanji is there,” Lusambo said in response to Hamasaka’s challenge on who would take over if President Hichilema were to resign.
He said the PF as a party had a choice to make, saying “we want a person who can win us an election.”
“And right now there is nobody other than Edgar Lungu. Edgar Lungu is more popular than any other politician. If an election was called today, HH can’t beat Edgar Lungu because Edgar Lungu is far more popular,” Lusambo said. “The suffering caused by Hichilema is unbearable. Zambians have said no to these hardships. The last time we queued for mealie meal was in the one party state over 30 years ago.”
Lusambo argued that Lungu was still eligible to stand as he contested the 2021 elections and lost to Hichilema.
And Lusambo said the miners in Chililabombwe, whom he said make up the majority of the workforce in the area, were angry as they are not getting the money they were promised coupled with the high mealie meal prices they are having to buy at K320.
President Hichilema said the government has activated emergency response to contain mealie meal shortages, but Lusambo said President Hichilema did not have the capacity to control the mealie meal shortages unless they stopped maize and mealie meal exports to other countries.
“We had successive bumper harvests under PF but as we speak they only have 320,000 metric tonnes and if not careful that will go away because of the arrogant minister. President Hichilema has no capacity because we would have seen it from FISP which was disastrous,” Lusambo said. “I feel pity for President Hichilema because what he said and the actual thing on the ground is totally different.”
The UPND administration has urged Zambians to eat sorghum and cassava in view of the problems with mealie meal, but Lusambo said even if diet diversification must be encouraged, the government was saying the right thing at a wrong time as they could not tell people to eat what was not there in the first place, and that the mealie meal from the same commodities was even more expensive that the maize meal.
Lusambo fuurther said that he was recently tipped off by the intelligence of the “UPND thugs” that had been transported into Chililabombwe in order to cause violence so that they could frame him and the other PF members.
He accused the police of working with the UPND to frame the opposition, arguing that the candidate the ruling party had adopted was weak and they feared losing hence the rush to incite violence.
“The candidate they have adopted is not popular. You can just see how President Hichilema was received in Chililabombwe and how I as former minister was received,” said Lusambo.
