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Easterners will be considered useless if they don’t vote for Rupiah – Teta

Easterners will be considered useless if they don’t vote for Rupiah – Teta
Written by Chibaula Silwamba in Chadiza and Christopher Miti in Lundazi

MMD spokesperson Benny Tetamashimba has said Easterners will be considered useless people if they do not vote for Vice-President Rupiah Banda who is their own son. And Tetamashimba disclosed that chiefs Mwanachingwala and Bright Nalubamba of Southern Province have indicated that they are ready to be de-registered if any other presidential candidate other than Vice-President Banda is 'accidently' elected Republican president next Thursday.

Meanwhile, Vice-President Banda charged that Patriotic Front (PF) presidential candidate Michael Sata is fond of insulting other people because he is a mere grade four, an education level for six-year-olds.

Drumming up support for Vice-President Banda in the presidential elections on Tuesday, Tetamashimba said chiefs Mwanachingwala and Bright Nalubamba had indicated that they would publicly campaign for Vice-President Banda.

"I want to tell you that of two special chiefs in Southern Province; chief Mwanachingwala and chief Bright Nalubamba. They have said that they will publicly campaign for Rupiah Banda and they are saying that if anyone else by accident won, they would rather be de-registered not to be chiefs. That is a very big commitment from people who are from outside this province," Tetamashimba said. "Having said that, for you people from Eastern Province, you have had [late Reuben] Kamanga as a vice-president, you had Grey Zulu as vice-president and secretary general of UNIP, you also had [Lieutenant General] Christon Tembo as vice-president, you again had Brigadier General Godfrey Miyanda as vice-president. President Mwanawasa, when he became president he said, the best person is Rupiah and unfortunately also from the east. Unfortunately, God has taken away president Mwanawasa."

He said Vice-President Banda was in Eastern Province as head of state and his lobbying for votes was to just ask for confirmation from Zambians for him to continue in his duties.

"I want to tell you; the rest of the country will never forgive you. And if you don't vote for Rupiah Banda, you will not find a Kaonde like me supporting another Easterner; we shall say 'they are useless, we gave them a chance they didn't take it.' So I appeal to you to give your man a vote as we go to vote," said Tetamashimba.

And Vice-President Banda said Sata was unable to discuss things without insulting others because he was not educated.

"Some of my colleagues have been talking about one of the candidates and saying that all you hear from him is insulting, all the time he is talking he is insulting other people," Vice-President Banda said. "You also heard the same say that this person is uneducated; he has only the education which now our children reach when they are the age of six or seven, they already got grade four. But the whole adult has nothing but grade four education. No wonder he is unable to discuss anything without insulting others."

And Vice-President Banda said the government under his leadership had reduced the price of fertiliser under the Fertiliser Support Programme (FSP) from K200,000 to K50,000 because it wanted to encourage farming to enable Zambia to be food-sufficient.

"I have made sure fertiliser is in sheds in all districts of Zambia," he said.

On the water crisis in Chadiza that has not been resolved for over a month now, Vice-President Banda said he had directed local government minister Sylvia Masebo to travel to Chipata and Chadiza to find a solution to the problem. He assured that water supply would be restored by next week.

Vice-President Banda said most chiefs and opposition leaders had endorsed his candidature and therefore urged the people in Eastern Province to do the same.

"It is now incumbent upon you the people of Eastern Province to prove that you appreciate the confidence that they have given you by selecting your own son to become the next president of this country," said Vice-President Banda, who hails from Chiparamba area in Chipata district. "I ask you the people of Chadiza to allow me to continue the work that the MMD government has already started."

Earlier, FDD president Edith Nawakwi said Sata was not educated for him to be Zambia's fourth Republican president. She claimed that Sata had said he would remove all the incumbent parliamentarians and replace them with callboys.

"In 2008, you can't elect a president who is uneducated. It's a cursing. Sata is not educated, he is a mere grade four," Nawakwi said.

"How do you get a grade four to be a president? He will go to SADC heads of state summit, where the presidents of Tanzania, Mozambique, Zimbabwe and others are university graduates, how is he going to debate? We don't want."

She said of all the four candidates contesting next week's elections, Sata was the only uneducated one. She said UPND presidential candidate Hakainde Hichilema had no experience in political leadership, therefore people should not waste their time to vote for him.

However, Nawakwi's insistence on attacking opposition presidential candidates did not go down well with the crowd as some people were heard murmuring.

"It's too much. Why is she saying all that? It's not necessary," they murmured in their local Chewa language.

Meanwhile, when Nawakwi asked the people if they knew that she was a president, they said they did not know.

Nawakwi asked: "Have you seen a female president?"

The people responded: "Awe! [No]"

Nawakwi said: "So women you have started doubting? I am a serious president of an opposition party with members of parliament."

In Lundazi, Vice-President Banda asked the people of Zambia to help him answer to the insults he was getting from other presidential contenders by voting for him on October 30.

Addressing a rally at Independence Square last Tuesday, Vice-President Banda said all the candidates apart from Heritage Party leader Brig Gen Godfrey Miyanda had been consistently abusing and insulting him since he was elected MMD presidential candidate.

He said none of the three candidates had the experience to look after the precious Zambians in peace and unity.

"I am the only one of the three candidates whom you know, I am the only one who has ever run this country, I am the only one who has been Vice-President of this country not Mr. Sata and not, I like the Tumbuka way of calling Hakainde, Hakaivotele Hayeka," Vice President Banda said as people broke into laughter.

He said he had received so many messages from different people encouraging him to concentrate on the campaigns.

Vice-President Banda said he was encouraged by the huge numbers of people attending his rallies throughout the places he had visited and promised to return to Lundazi once elected president.

And ULP president Sakwiba Sikota claimed that Sata intends to be in office until 2013 once he is elected president.

"I am thinking to myself I have never seen in Lundazi such a big crowd. I only hope that there is going to be no newspaper which is going to not show a picture of this crowd, it will be criminal to lie to the people of Zambia. Everywhere we have been going this is the kind of crowd we have been having but certain newspapers will go and take a small corner and show that picture. Watch out and see what kind of pictures they are going to show you of Lundazi that's when you will know what liars they are," Sikota said.

Meanwhile, Tetamashimba repeated his threat that Easterners would be beaten up by people from North Western Province if they did not vote for Vice-President Banda.

Vice-President Banda was accompanied by Sikota, Nawakwi and Tilyenji Kaunda.

Labels: BENNY TETAMASHIMBA, EASTERN PROVINCE, MMD, RUPIAH BANDA

posted by MrK @ 6:06 PM