Sata talks about life in State House

Sata talks about life in State House
By Staff Reporters
Wed 14 Dec. 2011, 14:00 CAT

It's not easy to adjust here. They restrict what you eat, whom you meet, talk to... PRESIDENT Michael Sata says it is not easy to adjust to life in State House. In an interview with Gemma Ware from The Africa Report, President Sata said there were restrictions on what he eats and who he meets. This was after Ware asked him how he was adjusting to life in State House after 10 years in opposition.

"It's not easy to adjust here. They restrict what you eat, they restrict whom you talk to, they restrict whom you meet. But all the same, at least we are in the driver's seat to try and see to it that we can change the rules, that we can apply taxpayers' money to benefit the poor," he said in a report carried yesterday.

President Sata said he was able to win the 2011 elections because he had been very consistent and the people of Zambia had seen that.

"Our messages were targeted on the poor and from 2001 up to today, we still maintain the same thing," he said.

When asked about the jobs he promised and wealth distribution in less than 90 days, President Sata said it had not been easy to honour those promises but the government was heading in that direction.

"In less than 90 days you saw the price of fuel coming down; in less than 90 days you will see the price of mealie-meal coming down. So it's not easy, you cannot overcome those things overnight. You cannot overcome unemployment, you cannot overcome poverty, but our measures, our ministers' measures, our policies are going towards that direction," he said.

President Sata said Zambia did not need local business alone.

"We need development policies. We have a very ambitious road works programme. We are talking to countries like South Korea, Japan, Turkey. If we go for the areas which target the poor, because if we have one stretch of road, it's going to hire more than 1,000- 2,000 low-paid workers, they will have their money in the pocket. We are looking at the textile industry. We are looking at the factories like Mulungushi Textiles, Kafue Textiles, the sawmills in Ndola, several other things," he said.

President Sata said good projects like the ones former president Rupiah Banda embarked on in rural-urban areas would continue including building of schools and health institutions.