By SIMON MUNTEMBA AND SILUMESI MALUMO
EMBATTLED and politically naive Chishimba Kambwili who is aspiring to be Hakainde Hichilema’s running mate will soon bite the dust, opposition Patriots for Economic Progress (PeP) president Sean Tembo has said.
But NDC national spokesperson, Saboi Imboela, said her party was not in any alliance with UPND but it was just a mere partner.
Mr Tembo has accused Mr Hichilema of being not only weak but a selfish person who could not willingly give away even a single constituency or ward in return for the support of any alliance partners.
Mr Tembo in a statement said in his political blackmail, Mr Hichilema and his followers have been advancing ‘defacto alliances’ in which they want every other opposition political party to agree with them and work in concert with them, failure to which such a political party is a surrogate of the ruling Patriotic Front (PF).
He said Mr Hichilema was now seeking to create a defacto alliance with National Democratic Congress Party (NDC) leader Chishimba Kambwili in his favour to get to State House.
“He wants us to rally behind him for free and escort him to State House. Even politically naive people like embattled Chishimba Kambwili who think that Mr Hichilema will make him his running mate will soon bite the dust,” Mr Tembo said.
He narrated that having worked with Mr Hichilema as chairperson of the media affairs committee as well as the chairperson of finance committee for the Opposition Alliance, he decided to quit because he realized that it was just benefiting the UPND.
Mr Tembo said after investing all his effort and sacrifices, Mr Hichilema was not willing to allocate some constituencies and wards for PeP to solely contest in in 2021, as part of the Opposition Alliance package.
“He point blankly told us that since UPND is more popular than PeP, the best he can offer is for our candidates to contest on the UPND ticket! To us, this amounted to dissolving our party and joining the UPND, which was contrary to our understanding and expectation from the Opposition Alliance. So l told Mr Hichilema that l will be withdrawing my party from his Alliance, and so we left,” Mr Tembo said.
He said Mr Hichilema was a weak and selfish guy who lacked the mental strength and prowess necessary to kick out the ruling party in 2021.
“But being politically weak and selfish is not the only handicap for Mr Hichilema, he also has an inflated sense of being smart. He falsely believes that he can outwit his political allies. But his attempts to outwit his political allies are so shallow that they usually border on crookedness,” he said
And today, he said, despite being politically weak and yet selfish and crooked, Mr Hichilema feels that he is entitled to Sean Tembo’s political support. How dare you sir! Just like Sata and his then PF fought and beat MMD, you sir need to fight and beat PF by yourself.
“While we were being attacked by Paul Moonga and his thugs along Cairo Road, you sir were lying on your couch at your home busy tweeting. And today, you feel that you are entitled to our support as you seek to fight the Electoral Commission of Zambia on very flimsy matters? Well, you sir can go to hell,” Mr Tembo said.
But Ms Imboela said the NDC had its ideologies which it stood for and it had made clear that it was just a partner and not to support UPND ideologies.
In an interview, Ms Imboela said the two parties had not discussed at any time that NDC leader Mr Kambwili was to be adopted as 2021 running mate for Mr Hichilema.
She said Mr Tembo was misplaced and should know that partnership did not mean that Mr Kambwili should become UPND 2021 running mate.
The national spokesperson said, “In this partnership NDC has it demands and UPND has its demands and all must be respected.
“So far we don’t have any problem with our partnership with the UPND. We have worked well unlike what Mr Tembo is talking about,” she said.
She said that come 2021 if the two parties did not agree on certain issues the partnership would no longer be there
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