Maravi

MMD convention will be a sham, says Mpombo

MMD convention will be a sham, says Mpombo
By Patson Chilemba
Wed 21 Apr. 2010, 04:00 CAT

THE MMD national convention will be a complete sham, Kafulafuta MMD member of parliament George Mpombo has predicted. And Mpombo said President Rupiah Banda exhibited a laissez-faire attitude in Milanzi.

In an interview yesterday, Mpombo said President Banda had driven the MMD into a terminal decline. He charged that President Banda was buying time for the holding of the national convention because he wanted to catch his MMD challengers unaware.

Mpombo said it was pointless to talk about the convention because there was little that showed that the national executive committee (NEC) would depart from its position to endorse President Banda as the sole candidate.

“Those who are aspiring to stand on the MMD will just wake up to say ‘tomorrow it will be a national convention’, and they won’t have time to prepare. In any case, the list of delegates will be heavily doctored so much that it’s extremely difficult for anybody to participate in these elections because NEC has already endorsed him as the sole candidate,” Mpombo said.

“Mr Banda has already been pre-ordained as the sole candidate, and also you know he refuses to be referred to as acting president…what we are getting on the ground is that this convention will not take place, and they are going to hire political goons to harass those who will want to participate in the event that it happens.”

“If Magande can be harassed at the party renewal exercise at Mulungushi, what more to the larger audience at the convention? I don’t think this so-called convention will be held under normal conditions…he goes to Milanzi, instead of talking about the candidate, he starts campaigning for himself.”

Mpombo said previously, people would have already known when the convention would be held but they were not aware because there was no democracy in MMD at the moment.

He said President Banda wanted to remain in office at all cost and this was dangerous because the President would resort to using all the methods to ensure that his aspirations were achieved.

“If you have a leadership that doesn’t give a damn to what the public say, then you have a big problem because whether something is wrong, they will go ahead with it,” Mpombo said.

He said what mattered most to President Banda was personal aggrandisement and massaging his personal ego.

Mpombo said it was no longer about MMD.
“But you see Mr Banda is capable of driving the party into extinction as long as he can achieve his personal desire,” he said.

Mpombo said rules in the MMD were no longer being followed.
“If there will be a convention, it will be a sham. Yes, it will be a complete sham,” he said.

And Mpombo asked President Banda not to repeat the same attitude he exhibited in Milanzi.
He said instead of spending more time campaigning for his 2011 re-election and attacking Patriotic Front (PF) president Michael Sata and UPND leader Hakainde Hichilema, President Banda should have spent more time campaigning for the Milanzi MMD aspiring candidate.

“I think the biggest problem is he took a laissez faire attitude in Milanzi, thinking because ‘this is a home constituency’. But again on the national scale you find that the party is bleeding to death and he is not worried. Like I did say, there is a lot of propaganda. To him, it’s a home ground.

Obviously there is this manipulation of the people psychologically,” Mpombo said. “But you see what is important is that he has driven the party as a national party into a terminal decline. By the time they wake up, there will be no MMD to talk about.”

Mpombo said President Banda was overconfident but winning the support of Zambians was not about Milanzi.

“So the attitude that has been displayed in Milanzi, it will be replicated elsewhere with grave consequences, because he just went to drum up support for his candidature, talking about the opposition leadership as if it was them standing,” said Mpombo.

Labels: BY-ELECTIONS, GEORGE MPOMBO, MMD, RUPIAH BANDA

posted by MrK @ 3:35 PM