‘$30m debt shows Sata’s thirst for power’

Sources from the opposition party revealed last weekend that Mr Sata was under pressure from the Taiwanese Green Party to pay back about $30 million he had obtained to finance his election campaigns in 2006 and 2008.

Committee of Citizens executive director Gregory Chifire said in Lusaka yesterday that Mr Sata’s reckless borrowing of money showed his desperation for power.

“It actually shows that he is only interested in enriching himself, he uses the Zambian people as collateral to obtain loans.

“This should serve as a wake-up call to the Zambian people that he is not interested in moving this country forward. His quest for power is not about the people but himself,” Mr Chifire said.

He said it was wrong for the PF leader to use the country as a mortgage to obtain loans, and expressed sadness that a person aspiring for the highest office in the land was engaging in deceitful behaviour.
“He wants to sell the country to the highest bidder. Just imagine what would happen if by mistake he became president?” he said.

On Sunday, former PF secretary general Edward Mumbi confirmed that the PF leader had obtained a lot of money from the Taiwanese, which he used to finance the 2006 and 2008 campaigns.

Mr Chifire also challenged Mr Sata to state whether or not he told former United Transport and Taxis Association chairperson Willie Nsanda that his father was a Tanzanian and that he would help the Chimwemwe Member of Parliament (MP) change his identity to that of a Tanzanian.

Mr Nsanda, who is now PF’s chairperson for transport, was on November 15, 2001 quoted in the Times as having revealed that Mr Sata had approached and requested him to mobilise 600 men from bus stations to cause country-wide riots after second Republican president Frederick Chiluba left him out and picked the late president Levy Mwanawasa as MMD’s presidential candidate.
[ Times of Zambia ]