Mon, 06 Mar 2017 10:23:49 +0000
By OSCAR MALIPENGA
IT is extremely unpatriotic and insincere on the part of Mr. Hakainde Hichilema to insinuate to the Commonwealth that the election was stolen when he has failed many times to answer how many votes were stolen and where he won, special assistant to the President for press and public relations Amos Chanda has said.
Mr. Chanda said President Edgar Lungu had won in Northern, Eastern, Muchinga, Luapula, Copperbelt, Lusaka and wondered which country Mr. Hichilema was living in to claim that the one who won in six provinces had lost and him who won narrowly in three provinces had won.
Addressing a press briefing at State House yesterday, Mr. Chanda said Mr Hichilema’s conduct created a false impression about the state of affairs in the country.
“So this delusion any state of mind by the opposition is what distances him from the people because when you have won and have a claim that you have won you must say that you won by 56 percent and that two percent was taken away or that I won in Northern Province and that it was taken away.
“Among these six provinces which the President won convincingly, which province was stolen from him? Did he win in Muchinga, did he win in Eastern province?” he asked.
Mr. Chanda appealed to Mr. Hichilema to learn the concept of being a loyal opposition leader.
“When you are in the opposition and elections are over, you can just wish yourself well that in the next election you are still a candidate rather than to continue misleading international organisations that you won the elections and patronise the international media to insinuate that there is tension in the country,” he said.
Mr. Chanda clarified that the current situation was that there was no court case before any court locally and abroad challenging the legitimacy of the outcome of elections, adding that it only exists in the mind of Mr. Hichilema which was why he was misleading the commonwealth.
Mr. Chanda, however, said the Government remained open to discussing with the commonwealth if they so wished, adding that Government could submit to them the commonwealth observer report and other reports issued by other monitoring groups
“In case they may have forgotten they declared the elections as free and fair. We have a copy also from the Church Monitoring group.
“But we cannot blame them because they were listening to a man who thinks that he is also ‘president’,” he said.
Meanwhile, Mr. Chanda also revealed that Mr. Hichilema tried to hold hostage the chairperson of the Electoral Commission of Zambia (ECZ) to prevent him from making a declaration.
“And when the declaration had been made, you saw how they were trying to pull and push so that judges do not make a decision,” Mr. Chanda said.
Mr. Chanda said during that period emissaries of Mr. Hichilema approached the President to try and negotiate a government of national unit.
