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Rupiah’s speech to Parliament lacked inspiration - CSPR

Rupiah’s speech to Parliament lacked inspiration - CSPR
By George Zulu in Choma
Mon 27 Sep. 2010, 04:00 CAT

CIVIL Society for Poverty Reduction (CSPR) vice chairperson Partner Siabutuba has said President Rupiah Banda’s speech to Parliament lacks inspiration to Zambians regarding poverty reduction.

In an interview, Siabutuba said President Banda’s speech was not good enough to meet the expectations of Zambians because he failed to address critical issues.

“As civil society, we expected the President to deal with issues on how Zambia is going to move forward in reducing poverty, especially that we are now concluding on the Fifth National Development Plan and embarking on the Sixth National Development Plan,” Siabutuba said.

“These are the issues we expected the President to elaborate very clearly. How we are prepared as a country in terms of financial resources, especially that he has asked donors to pack their bags and go. We were eagerly waiting for his comments on donors because you know that a few weeks ago, he said that donors should pack their bags and go, and yet in Parliament he appeals for donor support to be able to have Zambia realise its vision.

“His statement doesn’t tie well with the Secretary to the Treasury’s position that Zambia will require about K75 trillion for the 2011-2012 national budgets and the Medium Term Expenditure Framework.”

Siabutuba said the MMD and President Banda needed to realise that the country could not attain the desired level of development without the support of cooperating partners whom the President recently asked to pack their bags and leave.

He said the civil society throughout the nation expected President Banda to apologise and retract his scathing remarks on donors who were concerned about the high levels of abuse of public funds by the government.

“We expected President Banda to say sorry for urging cooperating partners to pack their bags and go. It is a big contradiction for the President to be able to say donors should support us and at the same time he says they should pack their bags and go. These technocrats are projecting K75 trillion. Where is that kind of money going to come from if the President and his government are frustrating donors?” asked Siabutuba.

“We expected the President this time around to have withdrawn that statement he made, nothing else apart from withdrawing because we need donors for national development. I can assure you that even the Sixth National Development Plan will be a pipedream. We shall not realise, we have not achieved much in the Fifth National Development Plan. Therefore, it is now or never that we should actually ask those donors who are not here to pack their bags and come to Zambia; not the other way round.”

Recently, President Banda asked donors to pack their bags and leave if they were not happy instead of poking their noses into the country’s business. However, President Banda last week said the country could not attain its vision of being a middle income country by 2030 without the support of cooperating partners.

Labels: CSPR, PARTNER SIABUTUBA, RUPIAH BANDA, SIXTH NATIONAL DEVELOPMENT PLAN

posted by MrK @ 6:51 PM