The Socialist Party (SP) says the country is in deep crisis due to reckless borrowing by the government, which requires about 119 percent of the countries income to repay the debt in 2021.
Speaking on 5FM’s burning issue radio programme party, General Treasurer Dr Chris Mwikisa expressed concern that the country’s debt situation would compromise social sector service delivery.
“If you pay all your debt, how are you going to manage your social sector requirements? How are you going to meet your health requirements? You must buy the medicine, you must buy the equipment that you require, you must buy all that is required for hospitals, if you are paying all your money, how are you going to meet your education requirements, it means that you are drying up, you are not able to meet your requirements,” said Dr Mwikisa.
Dr Mwikisa charged that the country is not utilizing the resources that it has borrowed effectively and prudently.
And Dr Mwikisa said the 2021 National Budget failed to address people’s expectations.
“If you look at the allocations of some of the key sectors, let’s take the social sectors, the allocations have declined over time, how are they going to resuscitate the economy,” he said.
He noted that once the Socialist Party forms government it would address the question of debt that had caused so much distress and anxiety in the country.
Dr Mwikisa said once in power, the SP would renegotiate the loan repayments and ensure that the working class were not further as they were already the most affected by the current government’s poor decisions and inconsistent policies.
He added that the country needed to reduce on unnecessary costs such as international meetings where the country government diplomatic representation.
Dr Mwikisa outlined areas such as procurement of expensive automobiles for government officials as being wasteful.
He said the government needed to raise revenue from the mines by introducing policies that would bolster efficiency and productivity.
I thought you can only mark an exam if you have a marking key or actual answers. Those that are saying the budget is not good should tell us how a good budget should have been, taking consideration the actual debt situation. Give the alternative sources if taxing people is too much. Why are we like this? We are absolutely not helpful at all.
And you can imagine the same PF government that put us in this terrible economic situation, are positioning themselves to come back in 2021. Defies logic because what are they going to come and do differently to improve our fortunes when they have failed to do the same in 10 years
Each time a population cedes its rights and privileges to the ruling class the ground they stand on shrinks. It is not rocket science. We have allowed, with each election, our destiny to be in the hands of incompetents and clueless leadership to the extent that we think every decision they take is “God given”, “Intelligent” and in some hard-to-understand cases, “For Our Good”. The result is malaise and theft as we are witnessing now. Ni zanu izo!
#Very Independent, meanwhile you are enjoying the rides on the roads built by the loans. use.less people.
Says a useless party that believes in spending money that doesn’t exist in a socialist economy. Mistele the reason we may have to borrow once in while is because people like your leader mmembe avoid paying taxes. So please do not insult our intelligence
You gave us pf , but you forgot is that we all go to the same shops. And when you were busy singing alalila oweee, chikonko mwikate song, you thought you will have prices reserved specifically for you, but here we are today.
Really missing the MMD days
KZ
“….. Mistele the reason we may have to borrow once in while is….”
Ati
“ once in a while “
after $20 billion in debt ???
Hehehehe
This tell you why Zambian is in an economic mess
How wonderful it is to know that Dr. Chris Mwikisa, a former UNZA don and WHO employee is now Socialist Party General Treasurer. That is the kind of enrichment of political parties that the country requires. Keep it up doc and provide the checks and balances to the government of the day in a sober manner. These parties need the intellectual depth of people coming out of academia. It is also important that we have more of our parties attracting people of the caliber of Dr. Mwikisa.
It is taking too long to set up Commission of Inquiry on HH. Do it now, so UPND and opposition can reorganize.
Set up the fvcking commission now?
Why are we pretending like we don’t know where the money has gone? Why should the country be liable for debt it did not borrow? We need a commission of inquiry to find out where the $20B has gone
WRONG ANALYSIS
WE ARE IN DEBT BECAUSE THE GDP OR SIZE OF THE ZAMBIAN ECONOMY IS SMALL BUT ZAMBIA IS UNDERDEVOPED.
LET US GROW THE ECONOMY MORE TO. MEET THE NEEDS OF THE PUBLIC AT LARGE.
SPOUTING OF TIRED SOCIALIST RHETORIC WILL NOT GET US ANYWHERE
LET’S GROW TO EXPORT
. MANUFACTURE FOR EXPORT
STOP EXPORTING DOLLARS TO OTHER COUNTRIES THROUGH MALLS AND EXPATRIATES
WRONG ANALYSIS!
WE ARE IN DEBT BECAUSE THE GDP OR SIZE OF THE ZAMBIAN ECONOMY IS SMALL BUT ZAMBIA IS UNDERDEVOPED.
LET US GROW THE ECONOMY MORE TO. MEET THE NEEDS OF THE PUBLIC AT LARGE.
SPOUTING OF TIRED SOCIALIST RHETORIC WILL NOT GET US ANYWHERE
LET’S GROW TO EXPORT
. MANUFACTURE FOR EXPORT
STOP EXPORTING DOLLARS TO OTHER COUNTRIES THROUGH MALLS AND EXPATRIATES
Ba Mwikisa who are you directing your baseless analysis to? You should be telling this rubbish to your Mmembe. He put pf were it is today. He has always boasted of being a king maker, until he didn’t make this king & it bite him for fighting it. So we already know this nonse.se you speak, only we blame Mmembe
Any socialist successes? North Korea – murder galore, including of uncles, closed-shop, Venezuela – misery everywhere, Cuba – no freedom of any sort, oppression round the clock, former soviet regimes, strange electoral practices and tendencies. The list of countries espousing socialism exhibit unmitigated failure and the hated dictatorships. Not worth thinking about in Zambia.
He is right about reckless borrowing, but makes no sense when he talks of his party’s plan to solve the crisis.
From all I can tell, the Socialists’ platform involves nationalization of private assets and ramping up public spending so that no one “suffers”. How on earth you square these objectives with debt rescheduling let alone sound fiscal management and no additional borrowing is beyond belief. It takes more than slogans to run an economy!
Not to mention, reducing on international meetings as Mwikisa says is a drop in the ocean. Be serious. If this is “the plan” with so many international meetings canceled because of COVID surely Zambia is reaping the benefit already. How’s that working on the recovery front; see any big improvement yet?
This is strange you cannot develope without borrowing these developed nations wouldn’t have been where they are , and they borrow more finances they borrow in trillions and not in billions.
Zambia has seen massive infrastructure building and schools hospitals roads are in good shape, I don’t know how politicians think keeping money in the bank is retarding development.
A business man doesn’t keep money in the bank but in assets where it is safe , having infrastructure in good condition makes economy to run smoothly and therefore it won’t take long before you pay back what you borrowed.
If money cannot work for the nation then you don’t need it, if you build airports then you should have eroplanes if you have roads you must have cars, think of how Zambians have bought…
THE government says this year’s National Day of Prayer, Fasting and Reconciliation will focus on the recovery of the economy and sustenance of national peace.
Disaster!!!
Reckless borrowing…na ntota gwa. Chapa mutu kuyumilila baba. Kaya tiyenda kuti…….