By Isaac Zulu
Green Party leader Peter Sinkamba has said that Zambia’s economy has remained unstable under the UPND administration, saying the determinants of economic fundamentals that were prevailing in the PF government have not changed.
And Sinkamba has said that there is nothing to celebrate about the reduction in fuel pump prices that has in the past two months.
Speaking in an interview, Sinkamba has observed that the the rate at which the Zambian Kwacha has been trading against the United States Dollars has remained the same, the cost of living is still high and fuel pump prices have not been stable.
“In September last year the Kwacha was trading at K17 per US Dollar. One year down the line the Zambian Kwacha is still at K17 against the Dollar. Have you noticed any changes? The answer is no! The pump price for fuel was about below K20, but today the fuel pump price is about K22, meaning that there has not been any positive improvement in the economy from the time the UPND took over government,” Sinkamba said, however, the Kwacha is now trading below K16 to the US dollar as opposed to the K17 he mentioned. “Numbers don’t lie. The Catholic JCTR food basket for an average Zambian family has increased over the last one year, which is an indication that the cost of living has continued to rise under the new dawn government. The Zambian economy has remained unstable under the UPND administration. And this can fundamentally be attributed to the poor performance of the mining sector, which is our major earner of forex. The performance of the mining industry has adversely been affected over the last one year and there is need for the current government to pay attention to this sector.”
He said that most people in the country are living below the income bracket, saying only about one million Zambians are in formal and pensionable employment, while the majority are in the informal sector.
“Only one million Zambians are in formal and pensionable employment, the other four million are in the informal sector and that includes people that sell plastics and other merchandise in markets, while the other three to four million people are small scale farmers,” Sinkamba further said. “The rest of the people are largely dependent on others for them to see another day. And you want to take pride in the modernisation of the Intercity Bus Terminus, the construction of Kapalala market and other trading places across the country. The bigger picture is that the cost of living is very high for most ordinary people in the country.”
Sinkamba also said that there is nothing to celebrate about the reduction of fuel pump prices because some large scale mining companies have not been benefiting from such “abrupt adjustments but only benefit a small sector of the economy.”
Sinkamba pointed out that the monthly review of fuel pump prices, that was initiated by the UPND government, is inconveniencing to most business houses.
“It is only the taxi operators and bus operators that get excited over such downward adjustments in fuel pump prices who even go to line up at filling stations at mid night so that they can refuel in readiness for the next day. But you have mining companies that operate heavy duty equipment and cannot move all their equipment to the filling station immediately a reduction has been announced in fuel pump prices,” Sinkamba observed. “If you remember the people that sell their goods at Chisokone, Soweto and Masala markets were also negatively affected by the fuel pump prices. And at the same time, tax operators and bus operators were engaged in a protracted discussion and arguments on the need to reduce the transport fares. And it took RTSA and the people in the transport sector two weeks to resolve the issue, meaning you are injuring the country’s economy. So really, there’s nothing to celebrate about the reduction in fuel pump prices.”
The fuel pump price was around K17 for petrol and K16 diesel at the time the UPND was taking over office.
The Green Party leader also said that the reduction in fuel pump prices that Zambia has been recording is due to international economic phenomenal.
“If you have noticed, the US Dollar has been fluctuating lately, depending on the economic happenings at the US Reserve Bank. Other than that, there are issues to do with the European zone where certain countries have imposed sanctions against Russia, which have proved to be self inflicting on those countries because they are in short supply of petroleum products and gas. As a result, you get to see some adjustments, either upward or download in the price of petroleum products. And because our country is an importing country, you don’t expect Zambia to be exempted from international economic phenomenal,” he said. “So, the reduction in fuel pump prices is largely due to international economic phenomenal.”
But Sinkamba said that the UPND government has made great strides in eradicating caderism in public places.
“The only thing that the UPND government has achieved in the last 12 months is to address the issue of cadres harassing people in public places. It might be noticed in selected places now, but not to a large scale like was the case during the PF regime. For this we can say ‘Well done guys.’ But this is a relative issue as compared to addressing the high cost of living.”
