Maravi

Booing a thief, a lazo wherever he goes

Booing a thief, a lazo wherever he goes
By The Post
Fri 11 June 2010, 08:20 CAT

The mark of great leaders is the ability to understand the context in which they are operating and act accordingly.

It is very clear that neither Rupiah Banda nor his friend Frederick Chiluba understand the context in which they are operating. If they did, they would have realised that Chiluba is today not a positive factor in the politics of our country.

The great majority of the Zambian people see Chiluba as a thief, a crook, a liar, a man who embodies the worst forms of corruption. But Rupiah still thinks Chiluba has some positive political standing.

And Chiluba is deceiving himself that he can deliver some positive electoral results for Rupiah on the Copperbelt and Luapula, among the Bemba-speaking people.

Chiluba’s political campaign trips to Luapula the other month and in 2008 have yielded nothing in favour of Rupiah. They have simply exposed Chiluba to ridicule and embarrassment. But of course we know that Chiluba can never be embarrassed because he has no shame inside his heart, he is a hard-core crook. Nothing can shame or embarrass Chiluba. If Chiluba has a conscience that would make him feel embarrassed, he would not have done the things he did.

There is no person with a conscience that can take more than US $1 million from the state coffers of a poor country like ours and spend that type of money on designer suits, shirts, pyjamas, shoes and so on and so forth in a European boutique when the great majority of his people live in abject poverty, on less than one dollar a day. This is the man Rupiah has hired as a political consultant or advisor. This is the man they are trying to use to win the support of the humble people of Luapula and those toiling on the mines on the Copperbelt.

Simple wisdom would have by now made Rupiah and his friends realise that the deployment of Chiluba in their political campaigns was a mistake. And taught by mistakes, they would have become wiser in their use of this unpopular friend of theirs. It is hard for any person to avoid making mistakes. But once a mistake is made, one should correct it, and the more quickly and thoroughly, the better.

There is nothing special about Chiluba. Like his friend Rupiah, Chiluba did not become president of this country because he had the greatest wisdom and virtues. Chiluba was not a messiah, but an ordinary man who had become a leader because of extraordinary circumstances.

It seems Rupiah and Chiluba don’t understand where the country is today and the thinking of the Zambian people. Their behaviour, what they are doing reminds us once again that to truly lead one’s people, one must also truly know them. Rupiah and Chiluba, as things stand today, don’t truly know the Zambian people.

If they knew them, they wouldn’t be doing the things they are doing; they wouldn’t be making the mistakes they are making. Enough advice has been given to Rupiah from both within and outside the ruling MMD. But it seems sometimes there is nothing one can do to save something that must die.

Wherever Chiluba has gone, he has been denounced as thief, a lazo. And truly and justifiably so because the man is a thief, a lazo. No matter how much Rupiah may try to launder Chiluba as “a damn good president”, nobody will buy that lie because they know who Chiluba is and who he was as president of their country. The man is nothing but a crook who lives by crooking his way through life.

It is not in dispute, and it will never be in dispute, that Chiluba stole from the government of the Republic of Zambia. Even the acquittal that Rupiah secured for him from the Zambian courts will not do.

And indeed Rupiah, by now, should realise that his scheme to launder Chiluba has failed because the Zambian people truly know who Chiluba is – a thief, a lazo. And they are calling him by this name – thief, lazo – wherever he goes. And this is not out of malice or hatred. It is simply out of a reality that things must be called by their true names. And names usually come from one’s conduct.

The Zambian people have been very tolerant of Chiluba. They have allowed him to move around and speak or say whatever he wants. But it will now seem that Chiluba is pushing his luck too far; he is overstretching to breaking point the tolerance of the Zambian people. What Chiluba is now trying to do amounts to insulting the collective intelligence of the Zambian people. Tolerance does not amount to stupidity, to foolishness on the part of the Zambian people.

Chiluba is a disgraced politician who should live to pay his penance for the many crimes he has committed against the Zambian people. Chiluba needs to show contrition before he can think of being accepted by the Zambian people in the smallest of ways.

Chiluba owes the Zambian people an apology for the abuse of their resources and the public office they had entrusted to him. He also owes some of his fellow citizens – like princess Nakatindi Wina, Rajan Mahtani, Dr Kenneth Kaunda, the late Dean Mung’omba, among others – apologies. But Chiluba is too proud and arrogant to apologise to anyone, let alone admit that he did wrong things.

Chiluba is failing to admit that he maliciously detained these people on trumped-up treason charges. He is also failing, despite abundant evidence, to admit that he abused public office to enrich himself and his friends. This is the man Rupiah says was “a damn good president” and has hired to be his political consultant and advisor.

It is said that “you will earn the trust and respect of others if you work for good; if you work for evil, you are making a mistake” (Proverbs 14:22) and that “stupid people are happy with their foolishness, but the wise will do what is right” (Proverbs 15:21).

There is no political influence that Chiluba commands in this country today. And Rupiah and Chiluba are just cheating each other about what their friendship or political association can deliver. They don’t understand what is in their people’s mind today. Anyway, “a fool does not care whether he understands a thing or not; all he wants to do is show how smart he is” (Proverbs 18:2).

The booing Chiluba is receiving wherever he goes should be enough warning about what is likely to follow if he persists on this path. But again, “sensible people will see trouble coming and avoid it, but an unthinking person will walk right into it and regret later” (Proverbs 22:3).

We understand Rupiah’s political desperation. But trying to depend on discredited characters like Chiluba will not help him achieve anything positive. It is said that “depending on an unreliable person in a crisis is like trying to chew with a loose tooth or walk with a crippled foot” (Proverbs 25:19).

Chiluba always tries to portray himself as a very smart person, a very intelligent politician, a political engineer. But what is smart or intelligent about Chiluba’s decisions and actions?

Is stealing public funds and spending it on designer clothes and women a wise or smart thing? Is abusing political power that has been given to you by your poor and humble fellow citizens a wise or smart thing? Again, we are told in Proverbs 26:12: “The most stupid fool is better off than someone who thinks he is wise when he is not.”

The Zambian people are generally generous and peace-loving. But they are not fools to be taken for granted and abused without sensitivity in the way Chiluba is trying to do it. They can allow him to go around and do whatever he wants, visit his relatives and friends wherever they may be.

But to try to go around markets and their compounds to cheat them, to corrupt their souls with the sale of council houses and promises of all sorts of things for them to support and vote for his savior Rupiah is going too far. There is a Chinese proverb which says: “You cannot prevent the birds of sadness from flying over your head, but you can prevent them from building nests in your hair.”

Truly, the Zambian people have no reason to stop Chiluba from flying around the country over their heads and going wherever he wants, but they will not allow him to perch on their heads and build nests for his lies, corruption, manipulation and deceit.

Rupiah has hired a wrong and useless, or rather costly, political consultant and advisor. Chiluba is nothing but a liability to Rupiah and the MMD in general.

Labels: CHILUBA, RUPIAH BANDA, SATA

posted by MrK @ 5:13 PM