Maravi

Students want red card campaign resuscitated - UNZASU president

Students want red card campaign resuscitated - UNZASU president
By George Chellah
Thu 18 Mar. 2010, 04:10 CAT

OUTING UNZASU president Duncan Nyirongo yesterday disclosed that students are on his neck calling for the resuscitation of the red card campaign protests. In an interview, Nyirongo said there was a lot of intimidation in the country and urged the government to address the issues people were raising as opposed to threats.

“I find the behaviour of government very retrogressive to the economic and social development of the country. The deliberate acts of intimidation of anyone who seems to be of opposite view is a very fertile ground for anarchy,” Nyirongo said.

“It is ridiculous to me for this government to imagine having everyone singing praises for them. Every citizen has the right to their own opinion.”

Nyirongo warned the government that he was under pressure from the UNZASU membership to resuscitate the red card campaign.

“A timely warning is that UNZASU already launched the red card campaign and the public may be aware of it already. And this was purely based on the immoral appointment as well as the abuse of authority by the police when they shot at CBU students.

And this trend is being demonstrated even now. What the police is doing has simply been extended from where they started from where they shoot citizens and make unnecessary arrests,” Nyirongo said.

“As UNZASU, we would want to warn government, me as president of the union my membership is already on my neck and they are calling for resuscitation of the campaign that we already launched. Should the government not respond positively to our call to ensure that there is freedom of expression to each and every Zambian, we would have no alternative but to go with the calls by the membership that we have because we already made that decision at the general meeting.

“They government are simply trying to awaken the sleeping giant. This is not a decision that I am making as Duncan but this is a decision that was made by the students of giving this government a red card after it failed to meet its demands over the conduct of the police and the immoral appointments of certain people in government.”

Nyirongo said Zambia was bigger than the leadership that is put in place at any given time.

“We understand that the current Republican President is a product of a dictatorship way of governance through the one-party regime. But it is only appropriate for him to change with time and not live in the past,” Nyirongo said. “It is erroneous for anyone in the current government to think that they will be in leadership forever and that bad laws and the wrong precedence they are setting would never hit back on them.

This government should be happy that people can only go as far as flashing cards to demonstrate their displeasure and not talk of the infantry and airpower. However, the approach that government is taking through its legislative arm, the police and other law enforcement agencies creates an enabling environment for new alternatives.”

Nyirongo said UNZASU under his leadership had embraced dialogue and peace, as it was the only way sustainable economic and social development could be achieved.

“But this government is deliberately pulling our leg. The membership of UNZASU is in excess of 13,000. Can you imagine the effect of distributing hundreds of red cards to each and every student so that they can in turn distribute them to their own respective places across the country?” Nyirongo asked. “This government should not provoke us but rather appreciate us as partners in development and they should be able to embrace our divergent views.

“My humble and sincere request to the Republican President and all the other members of his government is to create an environment where those that feel that certain things are not being done well can simply express them because only then can this government identify its shortcomings and work on them. Anyone who comes up to speak against the government may not be cited as being a politician or maybe belonging to any other political party.

“We are simply citizens of this country who have got this strong feeling about ourselves and the generations to come. The problems that we are going through today are because of what some of those that are in government today could have done when they were in their youth. We may not just stand and look at all these things because we feel that this country is actually being driven backwards instead of really achieving most of its political, economic and social development.”

Labels: DUNCAN NYIRONGO, FRANK BWALYA, UNZASU

posted by MrK @ 3:14 PM