Maravi

Chiluba, Rupiah pact will be crushed warns Sata

Chiluba, Rupiah pact will be crushed warns Sata
By George Chellah in Lusaka and Chibaula Silwamba in Milanzi
Sat 24 Apr. 2010, 04:00 CAT

PF leader Michael Sata during his meeting with Indunas shortly before he addressed a rally to drum up support for Milanzi Constituency PF parliamentary candidate Albert Banda (in glasses) in Katete on Thursday.

PATRIOTIC Front (PF) leader Michael Sata yesterday vowed to crush President Rupiah Banda and Frederick Chiluba ahead of next year’s general elections. Reacting to Chiluba’s statement that he was losing grip on the politics and now wanted to disturb the government, Sata, who is currently campaigning in Katete, said it was now clear that Chiluba and President Banda were birds of the same feather.

“Chiluba is accusing me of soar grapes. What soar grapes is he talking about? Tell them that I will keep bombarding them terribly wherever I go in this country so much that by the time we reach next year they will just be in shreds and unrecognisable,” he said.

Sata reminded Chiluba to learn from the past defeats he suffered.

“Chiluba has a short memory and he never learns about who Michael Chilufya Sata really is when it comes to politics. In 1995 when I contested as MMD national secretary, he didn’t want me and he tried to frustrate me by sponsoring the candidature of people like Newstead Zimba and others but I crushed him.

In 2001 at Mulungushi, Chiluba again didn’t want me to be MMD national secretary. He wanted Vernon Mwaanga but I defeated him again,” Sata said.

“When I resigned from MMD in August 2001 because of Chiluba’s dishonesty and formed PF, Chiluba used Peter Machungwa and others to form PUDD with the hope of destabilising PF and he went to launch PUDD on the Copperbelt. But what happened? We crushed him and PF became the most popular party on the Copperbelt.

“When we crushed him he came begging to me asking that we should accept Machungwa, Joseph Kasongo, Elizabeth Chitika-Mulobeka and Ernest Mwansa to stand on the PF ticket. Chiluba doesn’t learn, so even the manoeuvres he is making, I will crush him together with his friend Rupiah. Tell them that I will crush them both…the Chiluba and Rupiah pact will be crushed and the consequences will be too ghastly for them to contemplate.”

Sata challenged Chiluba to advise President Banda to call for an early election if he was still questioning the opposition’s popularity.

“If Chiluba thinks I am losing grip, let him incite his friend Rupiah to call for an early election so that he tests my grip. He can also incite those rebel members of parliament to resign so that we go to Luapula for by-elections and see who will come out of Luapula smiling or who has truly lost grip,” Sata said. “Tell Chiluba that contrary to his claims, my grip is firmer than ever before. And we are working and bombarding them with Rupiah everywhere.”
Sata dismissed Chiluba’s claims that he was panicking.

“It’s Chiluba who is panicking because he knows that he has got temporary shelter in Rupiah Banda. He knows that the shelter he is currently enjoying in Rupiah Banda is built on sand and will definitely not withstand the huge political hurricane that is coming next year. So it’s him who is panicking and is so desperate,” Sata said. “He has a skin to save.

No wonder he now wants to go to Luapula to meet their royal highnesses and also to try and make those selfish rebel MPs look useful to the very people they have betrayed. So it’s him who is panicking because he knows that he is standing on sand as far as protection from Rupiah is concerned. Anyway, let’s wait and see…just tell them that.”

On Friday, Chiluba, who spoke through his spokesperson Emmanuel Mwamba to the Times of Zambia, told Sata to stop disorienting President Banda’s pursuit for a forward-looking empowerment policy by suggesting that he was still ruling. He said Sata’s assertions were unjustified and taking the face of sour grapes in view of the strong relations he enjoyed with the President and the bearing they may have on PF.

Chiluba said President Banda had demonstrated his love for the people and urged him to continue, regardless of detractors like Sata who were losing grip on the politics and now wanted to disturb the government.

And Sata told the people of Milanzi on Thursday that President Banda, their own son, had neglected them.

A sizeable crowd of some Milanzi constituents braved heavy rains to listen to Sata’s campaign speech, which he started and ended delivering amid a heavy down pour at Katiula Basic School. Sata refused to shelter himself under an umbrella preferring to be soaked, just like the people attending his rally.

As Sata was about to start his campaign to woo votes for PF candidate Albert Banda ahead of next Thursday’s by-elections, the rains started but people remained steadfast while those that had run away to seek shelter under nearby trees and sheds returned to the rally site after realising that their colleagues, including women with babies strapped on their backs, had remained unmoved by the heavy down pour.

Sata decided to proceed with his address despite the rains intensifying. His aides brought him an umbrella but he refused insisting to be uniform with the crowd.

Without umbrella, Sata and everybody present, including journalists and several elderly men and women aged about 80, were soaked to the bone while some children sought refuge under the vehicles and some elders put chairs on their heads as they listened to the opposition leader, and punctuating his speech with spontaneous ovations.

Sata told the people that President Banda, a native of Eastern Province, had turned his back on them especially on agriculture – the mainstay of the locals.

“The late president Levy Mwanawasa gave you fertiliser. Your own son Rupiah Bwezani Banda amulandani fetelaiza. Mwanawasa, who was not your son gave you eight packs of fertiliser but your own son Rupiah Banda has reduced the packs to four,” Sata said.

“When Rupiah Banda came here in 2008 for Kulamba traditional ceremony of the Chewa people he told people at Chipata airport that ‘don’t vote for foreigners, vote for me your own son. I am your own son’. Now it’s your own son who has neglected you.”
He said President Banda had hijacked the MMD presidency.

“Rupiah Banda did not only dupe you his own people in Eastern Province, he has also duped people who worked hard for the MMD for 19 years. When MMD started, Rupiah Banda was in UNIP and he was telling you that MMD is a party for thieves but in the night he was meeting MMD and when all of you woke up in the morning you found that he is the Vice-President in MMD government.

Today the same person is the President and has hijacked the leadership of MMD. He is a political hijacker, he by passed everybody in MMD,” Sata said. “It’s very sad that people like MMD national chairperson Michael Mabenga are trying to use the Third Term tactics.”

Sata said God favoured the people of Milanzi with abundant rains hence they were annoyed that government did not give them sufficient fertiliser to grow enough food.
Sata bemoaned the lack of a clinic in Katiula ward.

“Mr Rupiah Banda the other day said there are plenty drugs in hospitals but I have not seen a hospital here. Now, if there are plenty drugs in hospitals, why did he go to Cape Town in South Africa with his knee problem for treatment?” Sata asked.

“There are rains but there are no clinics here, when people are sick where do they go? Jesus said, ‘cry for yourself and your children.’ Even here cry for yourselves, don’t blame me if there will be problems in future if you elected MMD. You have to liberate yourselves the way you liberated yourselves from colonialism.”
Sata advised the people to be wary of the alliance between President Banda and Chiluba.

“I built MMD, I was national secretary of MMD but Rupiah Banda had no position in MMD. He was at the farm when we were forming MMD. I left MMD because I saw the crookedness of Frederick Chiluba,” Sata said.

“When you are a small minister or deputy minister, you praise your President but because my brother President Banda doesn’t know what he is doing, he is hiding in Chiluba. Chiluba is not President. He President Banda is not even hiding in his own brother-in-law Kenneth Kaunda. Why is he hiding in Chiluba? Muzibe! You should know!.”

Sata said opposition parliamentarians were better placed to speak for their people and foster development because they had no one to fear when they frankly spoke about things affecting their constituents.

Sata cited former parliamentarians for Chipangali and Kapoche constituencies Lucas Phiri and Charles Banda respectively, who are now PF members, as backbenchers that compelled the government to implement development projects in their constituencies because they were courageous and feared nobody when they were demanding for development of their constituencies in Parliament.

He, therefore, urged Albert Banda to diligently represent the people if elected parliamentarian. Sata warned him against abandoning his constituents.
Earlier, Sata met 18 village headmen from Katiula ward.

Sata, who sat on the dry-grassy football pitch with the village headmen, was told that the area had no clinic, poor road infrastructure, no safe water supply and other social amenities.

Representative of the 18 village headmen, village headman Musamwachale said the local school had just been upgraded to grade eight but did not have desks and teachers’ houses. He said some teachers had to rent houses in the nearby villages.

“Please, when we elect your candidate, he must know that we have these problems here and he must address these problems,” headman Musamwachale said.

He said they had heard a lot from their colleagues about PF and they were glad to meet Sata in person.

“We are very happy to see you,” said headman Musamwachale as his colleagues unanimously agreed with him.

Katiula is situated about 16 kilometres off Mozambique road.

Labels: BY-ELECTIONS, CHILUBA, KATETE, RUPIAH BANDA, SATA

posted by MrK @ 4:01 AM