Maravi

We don't kill

We don't kill
By The Post
Fri 22 June 2012, 13:25 CAT

CARELESS talk can be very costly. And one who talks carelessly is ill-suited to be a leader. Whatever you believe with emotion becomes your reality. You always act in a manner consistent with your innermost beliefs and convictions. Think before you say anything or act and then act decisively. Be absolutely clear about who you are and what you stand for. Hakainde Hichilema is increasingly becoming very careless in his talk.

Why this desperation? On Wednesday, Hakainde phoned-in on an UNZA Radio programme featuring his advisor Douglas Syakalima insinuating that The Post and its editor-in-chief were out to kill him.

Why make such very serious allegations he cannot prove? We have repeatedly advised Hakainde to learn to discipline his disappointments. We believe that if someone is going down the wrong road, he doesn't need motivation to speed him up.

What he needs is advice to turn him around. The only way the politics is going to change and become favourable for Hakainde is when he changes his approach and attitude. Telling lies and half-truths about others will not gain him the political mileage he is chasing.

Reason and judgement are the qualities of a leader. And there is nothing noble about being superior to some other man. There is a Hindu proverb that says, "The true nobility is in being superior to your previous self." Leadership is practiced not so much in words as in attitude and in actions.

Hakainde is under no obligation to like us. But he has no right to tell lies about us and stretch things to the point of insinuating that we are out to kill him. For what?

We don't believe in politics of violence. We have never organised or hired anyone to go and beat up somebody. It is Hakainde's political party that has perpetrated acts of violence against other people, including against some of our reporters. Hakainde has never condemned the violence against our reporters perpetrated by his own cadres. Why?

For us, no doctrine, no principle or proclaimed political position can justify atrocious acts such as the physical elimination or maiming of another human being. No crime can be committed in the name of politics or political differences.

We sincerely believe that violence can only do one thing, and that is to breed endless counter-violence. Those who rise to go and attack others, to go and kill others are no better than animals. And we hope one day we will reach a stage where people like Hakainde see the use of violence against anyone as something that puts them next to animals.

Hakainde is not concerned about violence and seems to believe that violence in politics, in human relations is something that can be tolerated. How else can Hakainde justify his recruitment of the notorious violent politician like William Banda? There is no one in this country, including in the MMD, who doesn't know that William has a shameful record of violence.

The MMD has denounced his violence. But this is the person Hakainde thinks can mobilise the grassroots for him in Lusaka. How? Through violence! Violence should only, and only be used in self-defence. And if it is possible to run away from violent elements, there should be no shame in doing so to save lives.

We are of the view that those who seek to lead us, if they want our conversion to find true expression in the life of our national community, must strive to lead lives worthy of the Gospel (Phil.1:27, Eph.4:1), reject all lies, all harmful or offensive words, all anger and evil utterance, and be benevolent.
It behooves us to value each life as a gift of God, help the young to find meaning in their lives, and prepare themselves for their future roles in society.

Criminal acts can in no way be justified as legitimate politics. Violence is an attack on life which depends on the Creator alone. We must also stress that when a political outlook appeals to violence, it thereby admits its own weakness and inadequacy.

Hakainde's desperation for political power, if not controlled, may lead him to grief. He has now resorted to telling lies and to malicious insinuations. Mendacity seems to be his daily diet.

We have never organised violence against anyone even though our journalists have been victims of political harassment. It is in UPND where they accuse each other of killings. We don't kill.

Hakainde has resorted to slandering us with impunity. He doesn't see anything wrong now with telling lies about us. All this is in the hope that it will help him resurrect his declining political fortunes. It is true that with every election Hakainde has been going down, he is not improving. He shouldn't try to blame us for his political problems or poor performance.

Hakainde wants to fight us at any cost. He thinks telling lies about us will earn him political points. This is why even in the other matter he has been telling lies about us. And resorting to lies will just worsen his political standing.

It is a serious offence to accuse someone of wanting to kill you. If Hakainde truly believes that we want to kill him, let him go and report this to the police so that we can be arrested and prosecuted for this serious crime. And what would happen if tomorrow we decided to go and report Hakainde to the police for accusing us of plotting to kill him? This is lawlessness on the part of Hakainde. And every act leaves an incurable wound, like one left by a double-edged sword.

Hakainde has been telling lies about us in connection with Zambian Airways' indebtedness to the Development Bank of Zambia. We have never sought protection from anyone in this world from paying our debts. We have never discussed Zambian Airways' debt with Michael Sata or any other government official.

It is not possible for us to do so because in the first place we don't owe the Development Bank of Zambia any money, we have never borrowed money from that bank. And we challenge Hakainde to produce any evidence showing that we ever borrowed money from the Development Bank of Zambia.

The records of this case are still with his friend Vincent Malambo; let Hakainde go to him and get any document that shows that we ever borrowed money from the Development Bank of Zambia. At the risk of boring our readers with repetitions of the things we have stated before, the only thing we got involved in was to guarantee the Development Bank of Zambia a share buy-back if they had converted their loan to Zambian Airways into equity.

This was because at some point they wanted to exit the company if they became shareholders and the airline was not listed on the stock exchange for them to sell their shares to the public. The airline went into receivership before this process was concluded and the Development Bank of Zambia was stopped from converting its loan into shares by the government of the day. Where is our theft of K14 billion they are singing about, sloganeering about? We don't steal.

If others live by stealing and some of them have gone to jail for stealing, we will never be part of that. Our business ventures can fail but never as a result of financial mismanagement, stealing or other abuses.
As we have stated before, this matter was taken to court on political orders by the previous government to fix us.

When they saw that the court process they had initiated against us was not going to succeed, they started playing games with the judicial process. We refused to be subjected to such games and followed through the meaningful process of redress. We are not against the matter continuing in our courts of law. We are very confident that any independent and fair adjudicator will rule in our favour.

And we have repeatedly asked those handling this matter to put everything in the public domain so that there is no room left for lies, speculation and insinuations by petty-minded people like Hakainde. If at the end of the day, when the matter is concluded by our highest courts we are required to pay the Development Bank of Zambia K14 billion, we will pay it without any hesitation.

Our record with banks is very clean. We have raised capital at home and abroad to run our newspaper and we have been able to pay back everything we have borrowed. But it seems Hakainde and his friends think that they will make political capital out of this issue and win the next election.

They are cheating themselves. They are being very shallow and opportunistic in their thinking. If this is the only issue they have against us and is the only issue they are hanging their political fortunes on, then they are headed for unmitigated political failure.

Anyway, we are used to this type of propaganda, to this type of lies and calumny. It simply rolls over our shoulders and we move on. But to accuse someone of trying to kill another human being, without justification, is criminal, inhuman, insensitive and cruel. If Hakainde and his friends live by killing, we live by open discourse, we settle disagreements through public debate.

If they themselves live by killing, they shouldn't think everyone else lives by that, they shouldn't reflect their own conduct on us. Hakainde and his party declared us their enemy number one. We have never declared them to be our enemies. Those who have declared us enemies are the ones who know what to do with the lives of enemies.

Piling lies, one on top of another, in an attempt to try and discredit us politically and humiliate us won't work. If Hakainde thinks this is the route to election victory then he is headed for another humiliating defeat. Anyway, Hakainde is used to losing elections. But there is need for decency and respect for the humanity of others.

Those who want to lead should show a good example in terms of honesty, integrity and humaneness. Hakainde seems to have none of these. Sometimes those who need leadership positions the most are inclined the least. And this is true of Hakainde.

But integrity is the foundation upon which all other values are built and truthfulness is the main element of character. Without these, how can one think of being a leader of his people? We don't kill. Those who lie are the ones who can kill. It is said that if you can lie, you can steal and if you can steal, you can kill.

Labels: FRED M'MEMBE, HAKAINDE HICHILEMA, RICHARD LUONDE, UPND

posted by MrK @ 2:52 PM