MMD bans Katele’s wife

THE opposition MMD has suspended its chairperson for health Lumba Kalumba for allegedly bringing the name of the former ruling party into disrepute and ridicule.

But Mrs Kalumba, who is wife of former MMD national secretary Katele Kalumba, described the move as ridiculous and that the charges slapped on her by the MMD are a ploy to expel her from the party.

MMD deputy national secretary Chembe Nyangu confirmed Mrs Kalumba’s suspension in an interview.

“We have suspended Mrs Lumba Kalumba and the party has proffered a number of charges on her. Among the charges are putting the name of the party into disrepute and attacking fellow members when she has no facts. She also attended a workshop in South Africa at the invitation of the African National Congress (ANC) where she issued disparaging remarks against the party and its leadership, in a foreign country, to an extent that the people who conducted the workshop were not happy,” Mr Nyangu said.

He said Mrs Kalumba should have defended the MMD despite the fact that it lost elections and that she has allegedly been destabilising party structures.

“She wants to know where we got the money from to campaign and how it was spent. She has also been charged with leaking information on the national executive committee matters like the election postmortem to the press,” Mr Nyangu said.

He said Mrs Kalumba has been given 10 days in which to exculpate herself and that the MMD disciplinary committee will soon sit to hear her case.

Mr Nyangu said Mrs Kalumba will be given a fair hearing to clear herself of the charges slapped on her.

Mrs Kalumba said she knows her suspension will end up in an expulsion because of her opinion that the MMD should hold an extraordinary convention to elect a new leadership.

She said she was surprised to receive a suspension letter last Friday on her return from South Africa where she attended a political party workshop run by the Management of African Political Parties.

Mrs Kalumba said MMD national secretary Richard Kachingwe nominated her along with five other party officials to attend the training early last month.

She explained that four political parties attended the course and these are ANC, Botswana Democratic Party, Lesotho Congress Party and the MMD.

Mrs Kalumba said the MMD was the only opposition party at the event.

Mrs Kalumba said the topics discussed at the course among others included the role of political parties, issues of constitution and finances.

“The first topic ‘sins of incumbency’ was an eye-opener because it says that when political parties reach 15 to 20 years in power , they become complacent and they stop listening .

I had to talk about the strengths and weaknesses of the MMD,” she said.

She wondered what disparaging remarks she made against the MMD leadership when she made an honest analysis on why the MMD lost the September 20 tripartite elections which was the purpose of her attending the training.

“The other three political parties that attended the training are ruling parties and none of them keep money in presidential accounts, they all have audited accounts. All of them talked about separate party accounts which are audited,” Mrs Kalumba said.

She accused former republican President Rupiah Banda of pulling the strings and using Major Kachingwe as a front.

Mrs Kalumba said Maj Kachingwe cannot be objective on the matter because he is being paid from Mr Banda’s account.

“The Die-hard came in for Mr Banda’s campaign, in the past we never heard of Die-hard MMD youth wing and all of a sudden there is Die-hard. They want to shut me up, threaten me with violence so that I don’t reveal the truth,” she said.

Mrs Kalumba also wondered why her suspension letter is dated November 23, 2011 when the date stamp of the envelope is dated November 25, 2011.

She said it is unfortunate that the MMD is accusing her of destabilising the party because she wrote SMSs to some MMD provincial leaders on her opinion that the MMD should hold an extraordinary convention for leaders to renew their mandates and review the party constitution.

She said the SMS was copied to Mr Nyangu and Maj Kachingwe.

“If you cannot talk to provincial leaders, who are we going to talk to? I think people should understand that MMD is not a private club, a ‘kantemba’ it is a public institution,” Mrs Kalumba said.

She said it is unfortunate that the MMD NEC does not want the truth to be told because they want to continue running the party in the same ‘crazy’ manner.

Mrs Kalumba also said there is no reason why she cannot talk to the press to respond to attacks and threats from the Die-hard MMD Youth Wing.

“I asked Major Kachingwe to discipline the MMD Die-hard Youth Wing and now I am the one being disciplined,” she said.

Mrs Kalumba also said NEC members were recently asked to contribute towards the party, but she will not contribute a ‘ngwee’ until she has audited independent accounts on how the money was spent.

“They can expel me, maybe I am a mosquito, but the problem will remain. I want to stay in the party so that I can fight from within but they are so clever, they want to expel me,” she said.
[Zambia Daily Mail]