African Union (AU) High Representative for Infrastructure Development Raila Odinga has arrived in the country ahead of today’ss inauguration of President-elect Hakainde Hichilema.
Mr. Odinga is in the country at the invitation of President-elect Hichilema, who is expected to be sworn in today (24th August) as Zambia’s seventh President.
The plane carrying Mr. Odinga touched down at Kenneth Kaunda International Airport (KKIA) yesterday at 16:05 hours local time. He was welcomed on arrival by Deputy Secretary to Cabinet for Finance and Economic Development Mike Masiye.
Speaking to journalists shortly on arrival, Mr. Odinga said he is happy with the peaceful transition of power witnessed in Zambia. He said Zambia is a model of what opposition political parties can achieve if they worked as a united front.
Mr. Odinga, who is also opposition Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) leader in Kenya, said opposition political parties in Africa must emulate Zambia by ensuring that the opposition put aside their ideological differences and unite to work together. He explained that it is difficult for a sitting government to rig an election when opposition parties unite.
Meanwhile, Mr. Odinga said the government and the opposition should not have an adversary relationship. He indicated that the government and opposition political parties must coexist for the betterment of the people.
Mr. Odinga has since advised the incoming government not to extinguish the opposition but to rather work hand in hand in growing the country’s democratic tenets. He said the role of the opposition is to provide checks and balances to the sitting government.
Mr, Odinga revealed in an interview that government will not be able to know where it is failing if the opposition is extinguished. He emphasised the need for government and the opposition to work closely and deepen the country’s democracy.
Mr. Odinga further encouraged the outgoing President Edgar Lung and incoming President-elect Hichilema to working together.
There’s some hypocrisy here : both HH and Odinga have been party leaders/opposition leaders for long periods extinguishing any intraparty leadership challenge.No one can oppose them in their parties.
Superfluous advice. HH cannot and won’t extinguish opposition parties. He won’t even attempt. But he will shame the PF by how he will raise the bar of leadership in both communication tolerance and economic management.
PF will just extinguish itself no one can even waste his time on them. But we need strong opposition like HH – he used to make them have sleepless nights at least now they can go to bed when they bring back what they stole from Zambians..
Raila Odinga is opposition now. But he once was in power, and he only lost that by being an undemocratic d!ctator!
The bill for tax payers money used to campaign for lungu will finish off PF…….
Do not make the mistake to wrote off that bill………..you will regret it.
Hit them with that bill , least we forget about abusing GRZ resources …….
We are ye to see!!!
We must also build 2 roads, one for the sitting president and one the opposition leaders.
Ok, i know the LT staff and readers are mostly zambans and southern africans, so missed the obvious error in this article: raila is NOT the opposition. Kenya is a funny country where the current president is forming an alliance with the former opposition (raila), in an attempt to win against the current deputy president. In other words, raila is no longer the opposition. The new opposition party leader is the deputy president ruto. Btw, raila and the current kenyan president are the sons of the 1st vice president and president. The same people have ruled kenya since independence. Raila is definitely no HH.
We don’t do that here.
@ Ness thanks for educating us. We were seeing at it from the outside, now we know the inside situation.
@8 Ness and it now looks like Uhuru wants Raila to take over from him, rather than current VP Ruto, not so??
@zambiaisours Kinda, but not really. It;s not that he ‘wants’ raila to take over. Uhuru still wants power/influence after his term ends next year, so he is making deals with whoever can give it to him. They tried to make a deal in 2018 to create the PM position again, just so uhuru can have it. The deal was uhuru appoints raila as AU rep, gives raila allies important parliament positions, and helps him win the presidency, then raila appoints uhuru as PM. But the court ruled against the PM position it a few days ago. Uhuru and raila are not allies; just trying to use each other. It will end badly. If anything, ruto is the kenyan equivalent of HH. He’s self-made (but, from corruption), popular with the youth, has less-tribal alliances and supporters, and campaigns about ‘hustlers’