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Levy is a very nice and friendly person - Sata

Levy is a very nice and friendly person - Sata
By Chibaula Silwamba in Johannesburg and Mutuna Chanda and Pats
Tuesday May 13, 2008 [04:00]

IT is God’s wish that President Levy Mwanawasa and I are brought together to work as a team, opposition Patriotic Front (PF) president Michael Sata has said. And Sata, who had been smoking for 45 years, has advised smokers to stop smoking, saying it is a dangerous habit. In an interview, at South Africa’s InterContinental Sandton Tower Hotel on Sunday, Sata said President Mwanawasa was a very nice and friendly person whom he would like to work with to change the living standards of Zambians.

“President Mwanawasa went out of his way when he sent me here. He must have discussed with his brother South African President Thabo Mbeki because I was coming without a passport, without any travel documents and I was crossing an international border and it was a very big risk for the air ambulance to allow a person without any travel documents. I am very grateful, I am extremely grateful and I have expressed my gratitude to President Mwanawasa.

I have spoken to him twice and when I get to Zambia I want to go and see him personally and say thank you and discuss other matters relating to our nation,” said Sata, who has always been an ardent critic of President Mwanawasa. “I think his experience and my experience put together, even if I am in the opposition, we can remove the trivial tension which is in Zambia at the moment for the benefit of the people of Zambia.

The two days I have spoken to him – I talked to him when I was discharged from the hospital and a day later when I was complaining about my passport. Levy and myself should bring Zambia back to the original political leadership.

“His tone when I spoke to him was very nice, extremely nice, a very friendly person. I know him but I am saying that when he reads in the newspapers he gets annoyed and when I read in the newspapers I get annoyed but when we speak one-to-one there is so much tension which we can remove.”

Asked if what he portrayed in the newspapers was contrary to his warm relationship with President Mwanawasa, Sata said the bickering among political leaders portrayed in the media was dividing the country.

“You reporters edit, now I want to say it in Levy’s face and let him also say what he doesn’t like about me in my face and then the media will choose because by so doing we will remove the tension because when Levy speaks and I also speak, we don’t help unite the nation,” Sata said.

“The problem which we have in Africa is lack of interaction where the opposition don’t see eye-to-eye with the ruling government. In Zambian politics and majority of African politics, when somebody is in government, he is an enemy or when somebody is in the opposition he is an enemy so even if they know that what the other party has done is right they would like to say something disparaging to provoke the other.”
Sata said if he worked with President Mwanawasa, the country would achieve a lot.

“Former president Frederick Chiluba is coming to South Africa for medical treatment; Levy Mwanawasa has gone to England more often than any of us,” Sata said. “Everything that President Mwanawasa has done to me, I have learnt something. When he sent me to prison, I learnt something and now he has sent me to the hospital I have learnt something, so he exposes me to great experiences which he doesn’t know, which I can help him and he goes to England often. I have come here and because I am aspiring to take over from him, we can work as a team to transfer the technology for the benefit of Zambians.”
He said with the wind of change in Africa, there was likelihood that governments would be changing hands from the ruling parties to the opposition.

“But for us to avoid bloodshed, to avoid unnecessary hatred, it’s important that we start interacting,” he said. “This issue of chasing each other in the newspapers is unnecessary but that does not mean that PF will be surrendered to the MMD and MMD will not be surrendered to PF but the leadership must interact. If we interact I will tell President Mwanawasa what I think would help build Zambia, he will also tell me what he expects from the opposition instead of fighting each other on the platform.”

Asked on concerns that President Mwanawasa took advantage of his sickness to gain popularity and silence him over his criticism against evacuation of senior government leaders to seek medical treatment abroad, Sata said the action by President Mwanawasa was God’s mystery to bring them together.

“It’s not a question of taking advantage. He was taking a risk. Suppose I would not have arrived here, if I had died what was going to happen? Was he going to get the popularity that he wanted? But God wanted to prove a point that Levy and myself we have a duty to Zambia, our duty to Zambia is what will please the Lord,” Sata said. “So whatever was in his mind, that was God’s wish to try and bring these two people together saying ‘there is nothing insurmountable, why can’t you two people talk?”

Sata said putting together his experience and that of President Mwanawasa would help push the country forward.
“I have enormous experience than he has, I have been paying tax since the time he was at Chiwala Secondary School. I was involved in the political struggle when he was a young man. While he is highly educated, he is a lawyer, we served briefly in the same MMD government.

I have travelled extensively in Zambia and abroad and I think his experience and my experience put together even if I am in the opposition we can improve the lives of Zambians,” Sata said. “I know he is surrounded by inexperienced politicians who are ministers so not every advice they give him will be for the benefit of Zambia.”

Sata also said the government’s sending of patients abroad for specialist treatment should continue.
“My position on treatment abroad has not changed, what I am saying is that referral treatment abroad will continue but we must start building our capacity at home and that capacity cannot be built in 24 hours but we must start now,” Sata said. “But we should not rely totally on referral for second opinion because the politics in the world are changing. Today we can utilise the services in South Africa or United Kingdom because we have smooth political relationships with these two countries, but as politics are, suppose tomorrow we don’t have good political relationship, how are we going to utilise these facilities?”

Asked on how he was coping with life without smoking, Sata said he never survived on cigarettes, hence he did not have problems quiting smoking although he had been smoking for about 45 years.

“So if I never survived on cigarettes, how do you ask me how I am managing without cigarettes? Cigarette is not food because I completely stopped drinking alcohol in 1985. Alcohol is food, it’s not like cigarettes,” he said.
Sata explained that in 1996, when he underwent an operation in South Africa, doctors had recommended that he stops smoking but he declined.

“But this time the doctor who operated on me paralysed me from the waist up to the toes because he wanted me to see what he was doing. So it was the seeing of the unblocking of the arteries - the way you unblock the toilets – that convinced me to stop smoking. Based on that, I did not need any more persuasion because I saw myself on the screen the way you watch football.

“I am very lucky because I was first admitted to African Hospital (currently UTH) in Lusaka in 1957 for pneumonia which they failed to deal with in Mufulira. Then I was admitted again to now UTH in 1975 and that is what encouraged me to stop drinking beer in 1975 and I remained drinking gin which I stopped on my own without any doctor recommending in 1985.”

Sata said although some experts on cigarettes claimed that cigarettes affected lungs, his lungs, kidney and liver were still perfect despite smoking cigarettes for 45 years.

“But the nicotine contributed to my artery being thin so that the blood could not flow properly; and I saw it and I want to help myself,” Sata said. “We have agreed that for the next six months between now and October, I will be regularly coming to South Africa to meet the four doctors for routine check-ups, not necessarily on tax payers’ money but the same way I go to UTH and CfB.”
Sata explained that he started smoking in 1963 because the habit was trendy that time.

“In 1963 I started my business consultancy and the in-thing at that time everybody was smoking. You know as a big consultant with a big office and swinging chair and a cigarette and everybody who comes you say, ‘would you like a cigarette?’ That is how I started smoking,” Sata said.
However, Sata said he did not realise that cigarettes were dangerous.

“I did not realise that cigarette was dangerous,” he said. “I was once Minister of Health. They put labels that cigarette is harmful to your health but as Minister of Health, I was exposed and I can say 99 per cent of deaths in Zambia were not because of cigarettes. So it was not so urgent for me to stop smoking.”

Sata, however, said he was happy he had stopped smoking.
“I smoked every 30 minutes when I found somewhere to smoke but it is a habit; the habit of beer is out and now the habit of cigarette is out so what has remained is just the habit of politics and bridge building with Mwanawasa and anybody in government,” Sata said. “I would advise others to stop smoking. But the only way you can convince and help people from smoking is to provide a facility where people can go and check and prove to them that smoking is not good. Just talking without empirical evidence, you will find that our fight will not yield anything.”

And Sata said he would return to active politics because he was not suffering from any pressure that might affect his political career.
“The only pressure the doctors advised against was smoking, if I have to maintain a normal life. They didn’t say I am weak, I am not fit. Life continues,” Sata said. “I am not in politics for money like a number of young men in government I have a vision and that is why before I die I want to bring nearer good health services to almost all Zambians. That is my life.”

And speaking on arrival at Lusaka International Airport yesterday, Sata said there should be mutual trust between he and President Mwanawasa because as things stood there was no trust between them.

He said the nation would be the final beneficiary if he and President Mwanawasa developed trust. Sata said he would be meeting President Mwanawasa soon and that the National Constitutional Conference (NCC) would be on the agenda because PF could not participate in its current form.

PF general secretary Edward Mumbi said their party would not shun from criticising the government whenever it went wrong. Mumbi said it had always been the position of PF to dialogue with government.
Meanwhile there was commotion at the exit of the airport building as Sata emerged from the plane. Scores of PF cadres who were singing songs in Sata’s praise mobbed him as he made his way to the vehicle that was waiting for him. Surrounded by bodyguards and some airport security officials, Sata failed to make it to his vehicle and returned to the airport building.

Security officials had a tough time trying to keep away the mob that followed Sata as he returned to the airport building. The officials had to cordon off the area to stop the mob from entering the building.
Sata later went to the VIP lounge where he addressed the press while the crowd was being cleared at the exit of the airport building.
Earlier on arrival at the airport, Sata - seemingly in a jovial mood - cracked jokes and shook hands with police officers and waved at other airport personnel.

On hand to welcome him were top PF officials including vice-president Dr Guy Scott, spokesperson Given Lubinda, Mumbi, member of central committee Wynter Kabimba as well as other members of parliament and councillors.

Labels: MWANAWASA, SATA

posted by MrK @ 10:50 AM