NAREP leader Elias Chipimo has strongly castigated the PF government for the maladministration it has allegedly subjected Zambians to.

Mr Chipimo, an Oxford trained lawyer turned politician charged that the PF has for too long practiced what he called pit-latrine politics.

He said the PF administration has filled too many holes with their putrid waste and the smell within the organization has become unbearable.

The NAREP leader was speaking on Wednesday during a news briefing at NAREP Secretariat.

Mr Chipimo said in a weekly basis, the PF administration is being accused by its own members of stealing from the public purse and doing everything within its means to rob the nation blind.

“What is happening is only the beginning of a sad and slow death of a party that had promised so much hope to the people of Zambia when its founder, the late President Michael Sata began his crusade to lead our country,” Mr Chipimo said.

Below is the full statement issued by Mr Chipimo during the news briefing

National Restoration Party Press conference

Wednesday 23 January 2018

What have we done wrong?

My fellow Zambians, I speak to you with a heavy heart. I speak to you at a time when mediocrity, corruption, greed and neglect have reached the highest levels ever witnessed in our history. Not even in my wildest nightmares did I ever foresee a situation in which serving government officials and so-called leaders would be falling all over themselves to amass as much wealth as they can greedily lay their hands on and within the shortest possible time.

At a time when we have massive unemployment, cholera, delayed agricultural inputs, unsustainable national debt, increasing child prostitution, drug and alcohol abuse, early marriages, teenage pregnancies, gender based violence, defilement, and corruption the party in power has simply folded its hands and decided to act as if someone else was in charge.

The response to each of these challenges by our so-called leaders has been to issue threats and blame someone else for the ills they have single-handedly caused to the people. Our so-called leaders are fighting battles with ordinary citizens trading on the streets – the very people they should serve – and putting them out of business without any alternative plan as to how they will fend for their families.

On a weekly basis, the Patriotic Front administration is being accused by its own rank and file of stealing from the public purse and doing everything within its means to rob the nation blind. What is happening is only the beginning of a sad and slow death of a party that had promised so much hope to the people of Zambia when its founder, the late President Michael Sata began his crusade to lead our country.

Which leader in their right frame of mind remains silent in the face of strong allegations of corruption from former ministers within the very same administration? Only a leader who believes he can get away with it. Which country can allow its most precious natural resources like the Mukula forests to be wantonly plundered for personal gain?

Only a country whose leaders have become so blinded by greed that they are willing to sacrifice the future of their own grandchildren. Make no mistake about it, the crimes that are being committed through the illicit trading of the Mukula tree will be paid for – it is just a matter of time. Our nation has become a nation of official gangsterism – a nation in which the privilege of power is used as a tool of oppression to further the greedy ambitions of an elite few whose god is their stomach, their loins and heir insatiable appetite for ill-gotten wealth.

The PF as a party is a good as dead. It exists only in so far as it is able to control the organs of the state. It is effectively on life support, clinging onto the machinery of government like a parasite sucking the oxygen out of a limping economy.

For too long now, the PF have been practicing what can only truly be described as pit-latrine politics. They have filled too many holes with their putrid waste and the smell within the organization has become unbearable. So unbearable in fact that the cadres themselves that once championed the cause of the party, have decided that enough is enough and began to call time on the rot.

The stain of corruption will always stain the conscience of those who practice it and no doubt God is calling time on this evil that has robbed our citizens not only of their livelihoods but indeed their very lives. How may people have to die before we can finally address the root causes of diseases such as cholera? How many young girls need to become prostitutes before we tackle the factors that lead children as young as 12 years old into commercial sex work?

Cholera can easily be prevented if we set the right standards for sanitation and provide access to clean safe water to every Zambian as well as a proper and durable sewerage system to carry waste from communities. 53 years after independence, it is shameful to think that people have to dig shallow latrines that flood in the rains and cause untold misery to residents of high-density locations. It is a shame to think that 53 years after independence our men and women work for wages as low as K400 a month as maids, gardeners, security guards.

It is a shame that after 53 years of independence we still have no solution for dealing with the challenge of street vending. It is a crying shame that we have leaders today that brag and boast about corruption and being bootlickers. It is a shame that we have former leaders shouting from the rooftops about corruption once they have left power having enjoyed the very fruits of the corruption they now condemn.

Taking care of less than 17 million people in a country endowed with huge natural resources should not be hard with all the lessons of the past. Instead of sending the army into the community to terrorize and beat up citizens that have been shown no better way to make a living than to trade on the streets, we need to engage our military personnel to deliver civil works together with the communities that lack proper infrastructure.

We need to get back to the food-for-work programmes that built drainages and roads and tie this in with skills development and training. We need to allocate government contracts to a wide spectrum of stakeholders within our communities and offer them training as part of the package. We need to do this with the help of civil society and the private sector in a transparent manner so as to avoid the corruption and lack off foresight that has characterized the awarding of public contracts.

We need to turn the cholera crisis not into and opportunity for a select number of protected presidential cronies to make even more illicit money for themselves but into an opportunity to make ordinary people’s lives whole again. Instead of wasting precious resources on unjustifiably expensive fire engines and ambulances which could have been purchased from less costly suppliers, we should have been putting our limited resources into areas that would directly benefit the people and lead to lasting positive change in our communities.

We cannot justify a national airline with our current governance set up when we routinely flout the law and hold no one connected to the president accountable. The reason Zambia Airway originally went under was not because it was could not make a profit; it was because there was no accountability for the manner in which it was being run. Nothing has changed since that time – in fact, things have only gotten worse.

The lack of accountability is clear when you see the misapplication and misappropriation of funds as set out in the annual Auditor General’s report. What action is ever taken to discipline or follow up missing or misapplied funds? Contracts are entered into by the government in breach of he constitution and nothing is done. Article 210 of the Constitution makes it clear that equity held by the government in any state entity shall only be disposed of with the approval of two thirds of the members of parliament. How was the Top Star transaction legally concluded if this was not done? The Constitutional Court makes rulings that are conveniently ignored by the very government that passed the laws. When will the ministers pay back the money they have been ordered to? When will there be respect for the institutions that regulate law and order? How can a mere citizen threaten the head of the judicial arm of government and the Minister of Justice remains silent? The Head of State remains silent?

Let us rise up as one and demand an end to the mediocrity, corruption, greed and neglect that have so deeply permeated our country’s national leadership structures. Let every sincere believer pray that God not only continues to expose the rot that has infected our country’s national governance structures but that those responsible for bringing misery and harm to our nation be made to account for their actions and their crimes.

Let me end with a direct call to President Lungu:

– Do not use the army to terrorize citizens; use them instead as community partners to build the water and sanitation infrastructure required to put an end to the numerous water-bone diseases and to be an example to the youth in the community of discipline and duty

– Do not stay silent in the face of corruption but set up independent and impartial panels to investigate the corruption in your regime regarding roads; ambulances; fire trucks; medical supplies

– Do not condone continued plunder of our natural resources by pretending the illicit Mukula trade is under control but organize our urban and rural residents to plant trees and to protect them

– Do not allow current and future generations to become permanent beggars by borrowing recklessly and beyond our means but authorize a national debt audit and bring full transparency to the debt procurement process

– Finally, do not treat street vendors and marketeers like animals but see them as you would your very own children, providing opportunity for them to achieve their God-given potential.

President Edgar Lungu says there is need to strengthen supervision of officers charged with the responsibility of implementing government development projects across the country if benefits are to trickle down to ordinary Zambians.

President Lungu said his tour of development projects in Muchinga Province have brought out glaring issues of lack of supervision on projects by supervising officers.

The President said this upon arrival in Lusaka from his four-day tour of developmental projects in Muchinga Province.

“What has come out of this tour is that there is lack of supervision on the part of ministers, permanent secretaries, managers and others involved in overseeing territories such as provinces,” said President Lungu.

President Lungu regretted that infrastructure projects have stalled in the region and implementing officers were attributing this to lack of funding.

The President challenged implementing officers to substantiate their claims of lack of funding when resources are readily available for even distribution to finish pending infrastructure projects across the country.

The Head of State said he will now take matters into his own hands and supervise ministers and their permanent secretaries in order to oversee their territories and areas of jurisdiction and control so that development projects are implemented and completed on time.

President Lungu said he could not rule out politicking in the implementation of the infrastructure projects as suggested by ordinary citizens who wonder why projects in Muchinga province, which started much earlier than in other regions, are still lagging behind.

He said he will ensure that there is equitable distribution of resources in both strongholds for the opposition and PF so that people benefit from the projects.

Mr. Lungu said he will sack ministers who will fail to supervise developmental projects whose benefits Zambians must start enjoying.

“The buck stops at me. So before I am fired I have to fire those that are not working,” he said.

He added that, “People think that I am cheating because when you go there, they ask why projects in Southern province are funded and here they are not”.

He said it was scandalous for him and his ministers to just sit in state house and their ministerial offices when people want development in their areas.

He cited the provincial police command building which he inspected about ten months ago but has still to date not been completed simply because no one has followed up to get the outstanding required K8 million to finish up the building.

President Lungu challenged leaders to take stock of their responsibilities and said he will call for a meeting with respective provincial ministers and their officials to see the best ways of completing the projects.

He has since directed government ministers and officials to stop the blame game and rather engage in consultations to find amicable ways of distributing national resources even in the quest to develop the country.

The President said he will also travel to other regions of the country to see how far government developmental projects have progressed so that Zambians can benefit from them.

He was welcomed back to Lusaka by Vice President Inonge Wina, PF Secretary General Davies Mwila, some Cabinet Ministers, Defence Chiefs and senior government and party officials.

Lawrence Sikutwa and Associates Ltd, under its Madison Financial Services PLC group of companies has donated general cleaning equipment general cleaning equipment worth K50,000 to the Government through the combined defence forces in a quest to clean up the City of Lusaka.

The donation is anchored by the group’s core values on environmental protection that recognize that the institutions existence is made possible by the societies in which it operates. The group of companies that includes Madison Life Insurance Company Zambia Limited, Madison Finance Company Limited, Madison General Insurance Company Zambia Ltd and Madison Asset Management Company has officially hand-over 50 work suits, 50 gum boots, 50 industrial reusable work gloves, all-purpose assorted disinfectants, 25 industrial bins and 20 Wheelbarrows amounting to K50, 000 to help the Government through the Ministry of Commerce Trade and Industry improve sanitation and the general environment countrywide.

Speaking during the official hand over Madison General Insurance Company Zambia Ltd Managing Director Chabala Lumbwe said a clean and hygienic environment is not only a basic need for mankind, but a necessity. He added that the donation from the Madison Financial Services PLC group of companies is in recognition of the basic human need to live and work in a clean environment and a reflection of the group of Companies goodwill to the people of Zambia.

‘Our group is alive to the fact that our city has challenges of sanitation and hygiene. We believe this presents an opportunity for us to collaborate with the Government and other stakeholders to counter the outbreak of cholera and make Lusaka and indeed the rest of the country clean, ’ he said.

He hopes that the humble donation will go a long way in assisting the National Disaster Management Technical Committee in cleaning the Environment and protecting the personnel that are part of the cleaning process.

In receiving the Donation Minister of Commerce Trade and Industry Mrs Margaret Mwanakatwe commended Madison Financial Services PLC group of companies for the donation.

She said the Cholera outbreak has affected business and the business community. She added that suppliers and traders have been adversely affected and that it was the Ministries mandate to ensure that trading continued and flourished in a clean and safe environment.

‘The battle against Cholera will not be won if we do not have friends such as Madison, because we believe in pulling resources together.’

In concluding she said the donation will go a long way in the cleaning up of Lusaka City as the government is determined to have the central business districts and markets Cholera free.

The Minister said that the Government will ensure that there is continuous cleaning to create a clean and safe environment for business to continue.

She has urged the business community to continue supporting the cause to fight Cholera.