By SIMON MUNTEMBA
MCDONALD Chipenzi should stop hallucinating that President Edgar Lungu is scared of going for a convention due to growing dissent within the Patriotic Front because he has been unanimously endorsed by all members, PF deputy media director, Antonio Mwanza has said.
In an interview, Mr Mwanza said it was laughable that a UPND surrogate in the name of Mr Chipenzi could claim that President Lungu was scared of a convention when it had already started the process of the convention by holding elections from the wards up to the provincial level.
He was reacting to remarks in one of the local newspapers attributed to the GEARS Initiative Zambia executive director. Mr McDonald Chipenzi saying “President Lungu was scared of a convention because there is growing dissent with PF over his third term.”
Mr Mwanza said contrary to Mr Chipenzi’s assertions, President Lungu was ready for a convention and will emerge victorious because he has the support of almost every PF member.
“It is just hallucinations by Mr Chipenzi to claim that President Lungu is scared of a convention because the entire PF is behind the candidature of the President. President Lungu has been endorsed by all structures of the party, from the wards up to the provincial level, as well as the members of the central committee.
“So, where is that growing dissent he is talking about? The growing dissent against President Lungu only exists in McDonald Chipenzi and his UPND because as far as we are concerned as a party, we have unanimously endorsed him from sections to the central committee,” Mr Mwanza said.
He said Mr Chipenzi would do well to stop hiding behind the civil society organisation and come out in the open to support UPND.
“We fail to understand how Mr Chipenzi who is a UPND surrogate could claim to know what is happening in PF when he is not a member. Mr Chipenzi should not hide behind a faceless NGO called GEARS in which he is the only member and claim he represents the society, when in actual sense he is a UPND surrogate. He just has to come out as a cadre of UPND,” Mr Mwanza said.
He said Mr Chipenzi should instead advise the undemocratic UPND which has not gone for a convention since 2006.
“We have had seven provincial elections at provincial levels and we are remaining with only three (Lusaka, Luapula and Northern provinces). “We were scheduled to conduct these remaining provincial elections in this month and by next month finish, but because of Covid-19 situation, we have postponed the elections. After that, we were to go for a PF general conference,” Mr Mwanza said.
