By Daimone Siulapwa
SO, it seems the Patriotic Front (PF), a party which is championing change and hopes to form the next government after this year’s general elections, is only for those who have been rejected by their respective parties. Or else, how do you explain the way MMD rejects like Mike Mulongoti, George Mpombo, Mbita Chitala, Judith Kapinjimpanga and others have aligned themselves to the PF?
Maybe, the problem lies in the way the PF was born.
For the uninitiated, and also for the record, the PF was born out of desperation following the failure of its leader Michael Sata to be chosen as the presidential candidate for the ruling Movement for Multi-Party Democracy (MMD) in 2001. Apparently, Michael Sata as the chief executive officer of the MMD had hoped to be chosen by Frederick Chiluba as his successor. This was after supporting his third term bid, and also getting rid of everyone who opposed it and seemed like capable of contesting the MMD presidency at the convention.
The list of these person include former Vice Presidents Gen. Christon Tembo, Gen. Godfrey Miyanda, former Legal Affairs Minister Vincent Malambo and a few others like Edith Nawakwi, Ackson Sejani, Newton Nguni, Samuel Miyanda etc.
Unfortunately, Mr Sata had underestimated the engineering skills of his boss FTJ who instead of picking on him, went outside and woke up one Levy Patrick Mwanawasa who been almost forgotten in political circle as his successor.
With that scenario, how could the “King Cobra” possibly remain in the MMD? Worse still, there was no love lost between him and Levy Mwanawasa.
At the time Mwanawasa served as Vice President, he had tried to get Mr Sata arrested for alleged corrupt activity but was saved by FTJ who publicly reprimanded Mwanawasa while touring the stand of the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) at the Trade fair in Ndola.
This is what led to Levy resigning his position as republican Vice President and also made him challenge Chiluba for the MMD presidency at the next convention. With the bad blood between them, that is Levy and Sata, the fiery “king cobra” was forced to jump ship and form the PF with barely months to go before the general elections.
He first started with one Edwin Lifwekelo as his general secretary before ditching for him Guy Scott, another reject in the MMD who later on went to found the Lima Party with Ben Kapita and also the Liberal Progressive Front (LPF) with Rolf Shenton.
Having performed dismally in the 2001 elections which drew about 12 presidential candidates, he never rested, and went on a campaign trail. In modern politics, once elections are over, the opposition is expected to give chance to the victor to implement his policies while providing the usual checks and balances, but Mr Sata never gave Levy Mwanawasa that chance as he hit the road with populist messages of putting more money in people’s pockets without explaining how. As the majority of our people are poor and desperately looking for hope, most of them believed him. The result was that in the 2006 elections, Mr Sata emerged as the main opposition leader.
But again, he was joined in the party by many members who were rejects in the MMD and also those who had lost elections on the Forum for Democracy and Development (FDD) ticket in the 2006 elections. Almost anyone who was not adopted as a parliamentary candidate in the 2006 elections by the MMD stood on the PF ticket, not that they so much believed in the manifesto of the party, but because they wanted to have a way of getting or remaining in Parliament. The result of this is what we saw with the so-called ‘rebel’ PF MPs who refused to be dictated to by Mr Sata. These MPs such as Dr Peter Machungwa, Ernest Mwansa and Elizabeth Chitika among others, clearly believed that they were brainier than Mr Sata on many policy issues and could not be dictated to by the man known for bulldozing his way.
With that, one would have thought that the PF leader would have learnt a lesson about accepting any member who has been rejected by their respective party. But clearly, Mr Sata has not. He has now welcomed the likes of George Mpombo, Mike Mulongoti, Judith Kapijimpanga and Mbita Chitala to his fold.
Not long ago, these were die-hard MMD supporters who would go any length to defend the MMD President. They only turned against the party after their personal aspirations were thwarted in the ruling party.
For George Mpombo for instance, he expected Rupiah Banda to appoint him as Vice President by virtue of his position as Defence minister. Call it over-estimating one self! Mr Mpombo was not even among the names going round as possible Vice Presidents and his appointment as Vice President possibly owed more to the fact that he was Lamba than that he was competent.
In any case, we all remember how he was fired at the height of the fuel crisis when he served as Minister of Energy and Water Development. Anyway, the names that were going round as possible Vice Presidents were those of Inonge Mbikusita-Lewanika, Kabinga Pande and Michael Chiti, who are far more competent than the former Masaiti governor.
After failing to get the position, Mr Mpombo grew increasingly frustrated with the President that he had to resign his Cabinet position after which he started attacking President Banda while all of a sudden became Mr Sata’s number one supporter.
But Mr Mpombo had forgotten that a few months before, he was busy calling Mr Sata a political demagogue who the people of the Copperbelt would never make a mistake of voting for.
As for Mike Mulongoti, who was earlier expelled by Mr Sata from the MMD for opposing the third term bid and had briefly joined the FDD, it is clear that he does not believe in any of the PF policy positions. He is MMD through-and-through. Had RB supported him for the position of MMD vice president, he would today be praising the President and defending the party manifesto.
Simply put, it is the habit of welcoming any politician to the PF that is the party’s most undoing. Most of these people do not agree with the PF and are only there for personal survival. Unfortunately Mr Sata does not see it that way as long as they can help him to get to State House. Yet, signs are already clear that these characters he is welcoming in the party will bring more problems than solutions. For a start, they are likely to alienate old members. In fact, already, there are signs that senior members like Given Lubinda (a far more capable leader than Sata) and Wynter Kabimba are being sidelined in preference for these characters.
If the PF was serious about change, then they should reject these ‘chancers’ who are joining now. In fact, it is time for them to retire and leave room for fresh brains and personalities.
