PF versus UPND: Who is better?
By Osward Bwali
WE have witnessed an exodus from the Patriotic Front (PF). A significant number of the former ruling party’s leadership has trooped to the now ruling United Party for National Development (UPND). The UPND has also received endorsements from chiefs, political parties, student bodies, and trade unions.
This is an interesting and important area for the analysis of the general elections in 66 days. What do the defections and endorsements mean?
The beard is an interesting intersection of biology and culture. When you see one, you see a goat, puberty, a mentally insane person, umungulu, or wisdom. It is not clear which one we should think of in the case of Saviour Chishimba. Maybe his is just Yehuda Bendavid following the Torah to complete his rebranding from a Catholic to an Orthodox Jew. He is the man who has motivated me to write on today’s subject.
Yehuda appears to have been tasked by the UPND or he has tasked himself as the UPND campaigner. Yehuda’s assignment seems to be disparaging the PF and casting the UPND in comparative better light. The praise singers are loving him. To the neutral, however, Yehuda is likely a UPND hired gun and his AI-ish writing is base propaganda crap. So, let’s see.
One of the major achievements of the UPND is dismantling and destabilising other political parties using what critics see as ruthless underhand tactics. Harry Kalaba’s Democratic Party (DP) was the first and this forced Kalaba to exit and form Citizens First (CF) in 2022. A leaked audio reveals Levy Ngoma and Josephs Akafumba, both senior people in the UPND government, hatching a plan involving Mutale Nalumango to destabilise the NDC. Saboi Imboela’s National Democratic Congress (NDC_ has suffered non-stop attempts by the UPND to sabotage the NDC.
Using individuals and abusing state institutions, the UPND managed to exclude seven political parties from participating in the 13 August elections. Some, like Brian Mundubile, barely squeezed through the UPND’s noose to appear on the ballot paper.
By far, the biggest target for Hakainde Hichilema was the PF. Fueled by a lethal combination of personal vendetta and political survival, he has left no stone unturned. People have died, people have been jailed, people have fled the country. Notwithstanding Hakainde’s brutality and despicable mingalato, like the honey badger, the PF have shown unprecedented resilience of a former ruling party.
The PF is Hakainde’s biggest legacy. He has funded individuals, as shown by the leaked audio between Robert Chabinga and Doreen Mwamba, with AI chewing groundnuts. He has overseen a sham convention of Miles Sampa takeover. Instructed Registrar of Societies to forge office bearers lists and his dancing queen Nelly Mutti is so happy to effect the changes in parliament.
The PF did not do to the UPND or any other political party what the UPND has done to other political parties. We did not see this level of strangling and blatant assault on multi-party democracy. In this regard, Hichilema has been a wrecking ball, evil incarnate. When we are past this dark episode, I imagine someone writing a bestseller, “Hichilema’s Reign: An Attempted Murder of Zambia’s Democracy”.
The PF went on an infrastructure spending spree on borrowed money. They transformed Lusaka, Kalabo, Kazungula. Their thinking, and I am not saying it was correct, makes sense. Infrastructure development was both social and capital. Social such as schools, police houses and stations, hospitals. Capital such as roads, bridges, airports, hydroelectric generation, solar energy. Don’t be fooled by Hakainde, Milupi, or Yehuda. These are afflicted by pseudologia fantastica, selective amnesia, and political desperation.
If we had not removed the PF and supported the compulsive liar at Community House, the Lusaka-Ndola duo carriage road would have been a completed marvel and done much better than giving NAPSA money to a contractor who will extract taxpayers’ money for the next twenty-five years! The PF’s was justifiably pricier because it was a more ambitious futuristic design with modern add-ons. The UPND’s is very basic and pricier to the civil servant and ordinary Zambian in the long run. But, like I said, a beard can be synonymous with many things that are antonymous with wisdom.
It’s a pity very few now stand up for PF’s positive achievements. Some, like former PF media director Sunday Chanda, are now singing fruitless and senseless CDF songs. Baldness shouldn’t be mistaken for wisdom. Without CDF, PF empowered the police with decent accommodation and built an unbelievable large number of schools countrywide. People talk about the PF debt and even a blind man can sonta.
People are singing about K40, 000,000 CDF without much to show for it. Shamelessness has been institutionalised by the UPND. The only projects I have seen Hakainde commission are those initiated by or already commissioned by the PF.
We know where the debt went and the motivation. PF stance on mining was a game changer; with a Zambian-leaning ownership and control structure, revenue would have been meaningful in these now wasted five years. It is not how many mines, Honorary Dr Hichilema. It is the revenue for the poor woman in Gwembe and Chibolya. Mines sold to and benefitting crooks, yourself, and friends without meaningful Zambian ownership and oversight is hollow economics.
With nothing to show the voters to warrant re-election, Hakainde will hire any crook or riffraff to parrot debt restructuring. Five years, and that’s all you have to show? An incomplete restructuring with no tangible benefits? Peepe, badaala! Aikona, man! PF already begun the restructuring process. With hindsight, they would have done a cleaner job. And let’s be clear. The so much hyped plunder by PF has not been proven apart from Faith Musonda’s non-government money. Those pursued are largely political enemies. Forest 27 is alive and well with a UPND cabinet stamp of approval. Go figure!
Here is the paradox in Yehuda and UPND’s incessant and rabid attempts to malign the PF. They have half of the PF leadership with them now. In fact, they are in a pact with the PF shell they illicitly bequeathed to the Sampa-Chabinga duo. Given Lubinda can lie through his well-spaced teeth that Hakainde has done better than Edgar Lungu. What a low-life turncoat! If those are Hakainde’s new friends, he is a desperate man who definitely doesn’t need enemies. So, how do you condemn the PF while bringing them back for the elusive political capital?
Hakainde has got the PF shell and the worst of the PF. The real PF spirit and support base has moved on and doubled under the aptly-named National Reconciliation Party for Unity and Prosperity (NRPUP) behind Brian Mundubile and Makebi Zulu. You have to be psychologically examined if you can want to compare a self-made Makebi with Hakainde’s running mate who has scrounged for a living in politics with no tangible returns.
The PF faithful have turned up and dwarfed the UPND at every national celebration. The UPND is double the bad and half the good of the PF. Kampyongo has come out better than Mwiimbu; Lubinda better than Kansune; Inonge better than Nalumango; Chakolwa better than Church Elder. One can only dream what a Mundubile-led government can offer in national unity and prosperity.
It is no wonder Sishuwa Sishuwa, a patriot per excellence, despite having been a constant pain in the PF says he would not mind voting for the PF [NRPUP] to the decadent UPND if doing so is in the interest of the country. He says unequivocally, “Today, I won’t hesitate to vote for the PF if doing so helps secure the interests of the many and the Republic, even if there is nothing in it for me.” Be assured, Sishuwa is part of the non-tribal Zambians who in 2021 rallied behind Hakainde to State House where his tribal base had failed uncountable times.
