By Staff Reporter
Ministry of Information media director Thabo Kawana says Zambians must watch the space because the mealie meal prices will reduce from these high levels to the levels President Hakainde Hichilema assured the nation.
President Hichilema is on record as having promised Zambia that with his impeccable management skills as an economist, he would reduce the meal meal prices to K50 per 25kg bags, arguing that the commodity was high during his opposition times because the leaders then did not have the capacity to manage national affairs.
The price of mealie meal was at K120 at the time President Hichilema was assuming office but has now skyrocketed to over K300 in several areas of the country.
But speaking with Daily Revelation, Kawana said the high prices were temporal because of the several measures the administration has put in place to scale up production, which he said will result in the reduction of prices
He said there were many factors behind the high price of the mealie meal.
“First we accept that the price of mealie meal is very very high and it has basically reached levels where our people are finding it difficult to afford,” Kawana said, stressing that several factors have led to that and that solutions by the UPND administration abound including upping the production.
He said if production is to be ramped up, several measures needed to be taken including giving farmers the right price for their produce in order to earn profit, saying that was why the floor price of maize has been increased from K180 to K280 per 50kg bags.
He said there were also moves to scale up fertilizer production locally to cut on foreign reliance and hence huge contracts awarded to Nitrogen Chemicals of Zambia and “yakine (the other one)” in the Lusaka Multi Facility Economic Zone.
He said when people produce more it was envisaged that there will be huge output.
“For now the situation is dire but they will bear fruit and you will see that the prices will now stabilise and now go low,” Kawana said, and that opposition leader Wynter Kabimba did not need to be calling on Zambians to mobilise themselves to remove the UPND administration from office, saying the people must mobilise to ensure that they never again give an opportunity to people who were a part to ruining the economy.
He said “even put in your write up that I have called them that this country was in the hands of masholi, bakabolala, ba pompwe mushibila nsala (thieves)” and that’s why the UPND was having to correct a lot of things.
But reminded that the PF administration he was castigating left the price of mealie meal at K120 for the 25 kg bags which the new administration he is serving under has managed to worsen to over K300 in several cases, and that if anything President Hichilema promised that he will reduce the same to K50, Kawana said Zambians gave the UPND a five year mandate and promises were meant to be achieved within that mandate.
“Zambians gave us a five year mandate in which to deliver on our assurances. Remember we did not give the people of Zambia promises. We gave them assurances,” Kawana said.
But asked if the price will ever come down to the K50 promised, Kawana said: “We promised them cheaper mealie meal. That mealie meal has not yet become cheap and measures that we are doing to make mealie meal cheaper I have just explained. Yes your question is valid to say you assured people that they would buy cheaper mealie meal and I am responding to you and telling you that yes watch the space. We are putting in place measures, employing measures that will lead to cheaper mealie meal.
