By Staff Reporter
UPND and Socialist Party are bedfellows on homosexuality and they should not call each to out, but account to the Zambian people, says Economic Front (EF) leader Wynter Kabimba.
Speaking with Daily Revelation, Kabimba said what Socialist Party leader Dr Fred M’membe’s statement that State House is deeply anchored with gays does is to take away from the fact that both the SP and the UPND are advocates of LGBTQ.
“So that argument in my view between the Socialist Party and the UPND is very hollow. The arguments from both sides are hollow. Hollow in the sense that they project … each one of the two political parties as running away from the real issue, okay. That is what it does,” Kabimba said.
He said what the Zambian people want to hear is a categorical answer from the both the SP and the UNPD that they are not advocates of LGBTQ, not only in word but also in deeds.
Kabimba said President Hakainde Hichilema had on several occasions made a statement that the UPND does not believe in homosexuality and that he has done this very open.
“What we find difficult as Economic Front is that we have seen more enhanced open LGBTQ activities under UPND than what we ever saw under PF, to the extent that you now have embassies, you have foreign missions in Zambia flying LGBTQ flags with impunity at their residence and if you talk about the ones that belong to the European Union, they are flying three flags, their national flag, the European Union flag and then the LGBTQ flag,” Kabimba said. “We never saw that under PF and even as it happens we have not heard any statement from the Minister of Foreign Affairs condemning this impunity from these mission that are accredited to Zambia.”
Kabimba added that it is not enough to simply put forward a denial without following it with actions.
He said on the SP, his argument has always been based on the court case between Dr M’membe and Dr Cosmas Musumali against him and Millennium Radio and the Daily Nation.
“And I have said many a time that if only you people could take time to go and uplift that judgment and read it in which the Socialist through their general secretary Cosmas Musumali admitted that homosexuals are welcome as members in the Socialist Party. Now you can’t on one hand say … and on one hand say but UPND have homosexuals. We are not talking about the number of homosexuals that are in the UPND, or the number of homosexuals that are in the Socialist Party” Kabimba said. “That is not the argument. The argument from Fred M’membe every time and he says well go to State House you will find homosexuals there, it is not an argument in my view, and the truth of the matter is that there are homosexuals in Socialist Party itself.”
Kabimba argued that the issue is not on the numbers or who is accommodating a larger number of homosexuals than the other but who lives in the homosexual and gay movement, and that they both seem to do that.
“That’s what led to the birth of Socialist Party today. It was on account of our silent disagreement on that particular issue. So for me where I stand, the issue of who had more homosexuals than the other as presented in that argument however long it is, does not absorb the Socialist Party from the same,” he said.
On Dr M’membe’s statement that gay rights is against the culture and the country’s tradition, and SP does not support it, Kabimba said the opposition leader has always said gay rights should be respected.
“So the man is contradicting himself because now we are getting close to elections. He issued a statement that these are human beings whose rights must be respected,” he said, referring to the gay parade which took place near the Show Grounds in Lusaka.
Kabimba further revealed that at point when they were both in Rainbow Party, he remembered Dr M’membe phoning him when he made a statement against homosexuals.
“He said ‘no comrade, you drop this argument. It is an argument which you can’t win.’ That’s what he said to me on the phone. I don’t know why we keep getting back to it,” Kabimba said.
He said if the SP did not believe in homosexuality, there will be no money coming to their political party.
Kabimba said for his party, it will be a campaign issue as they will run with it up to 2026.
