CDF IS LICENSED THEFT
…It’s only shared among UPND members – Aka
By Mast Reporter
THE much hyped Constituency Development Fund (CDF) programme is just licensed theft which has failed to make any meaningful impact on the ground, Dr Akashambatwa Mbikusita-Lewanika has said.
Dr Mbikusita-Lewanika said majority beneficiaries of CDF were members of the United Party for National Development (UPND), which was the reason it had lamentably failed to achieve its intended goals.
In an interview with The Mast, Dr Mbikusita-Lewanika said it was an illusion for the UPND to keep singing the same boring CDF song as “development” because the programme had been turned into theft business under the current government.
“It’s completely theft. Licensed theft. That’s not development. The country is not going to develop like this. Yeah. But they are pointing to it. CDF, they brought it to who? They are the only group who are benefiting from it,” he said.
Dr Mbikusita-Lewanika said CDF was money the government was stealing from the people of Zambia to give to party cadres without accounting for it.
He said only when all Zambians were given equal opportunities, an equal share of the cake would the money make an impact and guarantee the programme its legitimacy.
“Not that you should be a party cadre. The money they are stealing [from the treasury] to give to their party cadres. That’s what they are doing. But as people, just as any citizen, you should have a minimum entitlement to health, to education, to jobs, to businesses, to contracts,” Dr Mbikusita-Lewanika said.
He urged the UPND government to create an equal economic opportunity system in which every Zambian could participate and not based on political party affiliation, tribe or relationship as is the case now.
Dr Mbikusita-Lewanika said the UPND government should liberate the people of Zambia from dependency and not tie them even tighter to imperialism.
Successive governments should move people closer to social and economic liberation instead of creating dependency.
“What we expect is that every successive government should move us closer to liberation. Not tie us tighter to imperialism,” Dr Mbikusita-Lewanika said.
He urged Zambians to aim to be liberated from the current colonial mindset of depending on the government for their survival through selective and enslaving programmes like the CDF, which was only benefiting a small group of people like UPND cadres.
“People should not be subjected to dependency. No, we don’t want to be dependent. We want to be independent, economically, socially, mentally decolonised,” Dr Mbikusita-Lewanika said.
He said young people, in particular, should not only aim at being in politics to change power with another power but aim at economic liberation.
Dr Mbikusita-Lewanika expressed worry with the current crop of young Zambians for not speaking against the ills of the government through action as was the case with the youths who won independence from colonial masters.
“Just power for power’s sake. That’s what politics is. But the country needs to be liberated. You should talk about being liberated by changing systems not saying ‘I want to be an MP [member of Parliament], or ‘I want this party to be replaced by that party’. Those are truly politics not liberation,” Dr Mbikusita-Lewanika said.
The UPND government has touted CDF as its flagship programme and has been banking on it for victory in next year’s general election.
But the programme has been fraught with challenges, especially lack of accountability, with the Auditor General’s Office raising serious concerns on how it is mismanaged.
