By Staff Reporter
No one held a gun to HH’s head to make the promises he made for which he is being held accountable, says Economic Fighters (EF) leader Wynter Kabimba.
Speaking with Daily Revelation, Kabimba said there was this argument going around from the UPND circles that things would have been even worse had the PF won, but that it was important to contextualise issues.
He said there was no doubt in people’s minds that the PF administration had gone off the radar, where there was no respect for other citizens, caderism and “perceived corruption”, among other issues, including a bad economy, and that the voice of hope many people had, except for a few like himself, was that the UPND would offer solutions.
“But to continue with the hypothetical situation that don’t criticise because things could have been worse is not just unreasonable but frankly ridiculous,” Kabimba said, adding that this was against the background where promises were made to the people that free education would be offered from Grade 1 to university, that the prices for mealie meal and fuel would be reduced, the Kwacha would massively appreciate against the US Dollar and other major convertible currencies and that there would be no caderism.
Kabimba said based on those promises, people were now reminding President Hakainde Hichilema to explain why things were not improving, “why fertilizer is reaching Northern Province at the end of the rain season, why fertilizer is not K200, why load shedding is getting worse.”
“So when we stand up and say we want to hold you to account against your own words, I don’t think it’s fair for guys in UPND to say we are being malicious. These are things that were promised by HH himself,” Kabimba said, and that President Hakainde Hichilema also promised that there would be no shortage of drugs in hospitals, and that he was shocked to hear Health minister Sylvia Masebo categorise the shortages as political, when sick people were feeling the pinch of the shortages and being exploited by drug sellers with high prices on account of the shortages.
Kabimba further said Zambians were told that things would be ameliorated quickly with the IMF deal, but that today Zambians were still listening to the same IMF package, with “youth unemployment still at 100 percent.”
“So you can’t pass the back to those raising issues…there is nobody who held a gun to HH’s head to Kate him say what he said. He said those things voluntarily,” said Kabimba.
