By OLIVER SAMBOKO
UPND president Hakainde Hichilema has threatened to deal with all those challenging him to explain his role in the privatisation process.
Mr Hichilema said time for reckoning would soon come for the PF surrogates who were being used to accuse him of corruption during the privatisation of state-owned companies.
Featuring on Radio Phoenix, ‘Let the people talk’ programme yesterday, Mr Hichilema said he was tired of being accused of corruption.
He challenged people with evidence to go ahead and report him to the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC), adding that soon, accusers would be made to pay.
Mr Hichilema said he was also aware that the PF government was using its surrogates to incite some families where he bought farms to claim that he got them through dubious means.
“I’m tired of PF surrogates like Economic and Equity Party (EEP) leader Chilufya Tayali and others threatening to report me to the police and ACC. My response is that the choice is theirs, they are free to report me,” he said.
He said as far as he was concerned, he did a good job during the privatisation exercise and that if it was in other countries he was going to be commended as a professional.
Mr Hichilema said Mr Tayali and others who want to report him to the police were free to do so but warned that when the law would be applied on them in future for unjustly accusing him of corruption, they should not blame him.
He said he never took away the $10 million from Ramcoz as some people would want Zambians to believe.
He explained that privatisation was a policy of the MMD Government and started by the UNIP government under former President Kenneth Kaunda in 1989.
Dr Kaunda’s government started the process after the economy collapsed.
He said PF was using another surrogate to accuse him of having stolen a house from Lima Bank.
“I have reported them to court and going to win the case because I never bought that house from Lima Bank,” he said.
Mr Hichilema reminded Mr Tayali that he would be abandoned by the PF just like the way FDD leader Edith Nawakwi had been left alone to face the law for accusing him of corruption.
“When that time come, I will not be sympathetic with him because he is asking for it,” said Mr Hichilema.
He said he had no time for time wasters like Mr Tayali because his focus for now was to ensure that the lives of Zambians were improved.
“My focus for now is to see how families can have three meals per day and children kept in school and not Mr Tayali’s rantings,” he said.
Mr Hichilema advised Mr Tayali to grow up and use his energy when still young to do something that would help his family in future.
“You are married to an Ethiopian woman so please be a good example of a good Zambian to an Ethiopian woman by behaving well,” he said of Mr Tayali.
He warned that the little benefits Mr Tayali was getting for being a PF surrogate were short term and not sustainable.
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