By KETRA KALUNGA
THE conditions for Zambians will continue to worsen because the structural adjustments being implemented by the UPND administration are not new and have not worked before, Young African Leaders Initiative (YALI) President, Andrew Ntewewe has said.
And Gears Initiative executive director, Macdonald Chipenzi says the UPND administration should ensure that things get better in 2023 as promised, failure to which they would create despondency among the people and contribute to voter apathy in the country.
Mr. Ntewewe argued that the situation and the conditions for Zambians would not improve in 2023 but would continue getting worse because IMF and World Bank programmes that the UPND are trying to implement are about citizens sacrificing throughout and not benefitting.
He said in an interview that running to the IMF and the World Bank to improve the economy has been tried before and never yielded any positive results for Zambians because their strategy is always about getting money from citizens and not empowering them.
Mr. Ntewewe said the MMD leadership implemented the structural adjustment programme to the letter but it never yielded results therefore repeating the same thing that has been tried before and expecting different results is tantamount to insanity.
“So I agree with ba Felix Mutati that 2022 is going to be hard but I disagree with him when he says 2023 things will get better because it will worsen. There is nowhere in Africa where the IMF and World Bank programmes have yielded positive results,” he said.
“In 1991, the MMD government implemented the structural adjustment programme to the letter and what happened is that there was massive unemployment, public utility companies were lost and sold to the highest bidder and the conditions of Zambians continued worsening until we had to abandon IMF and World Bank programmes,” he said.
And Mr Chipenzi commended the government for being open about the economic situation of the country but advised that they should also know that they are preparing the minds of the people that things would be better in 2023 and should ensure that is achieved.
He said in an interview that in democratic governance, transparency and accountability on managing public affairs is important because the moment there is secrecy, the government creates resistance in the people.
And New Congress Party leader, Peter Chanda said the ruling party should know that Zambians are discontented because they were not told to tighten belts during the elections campaigns but that they would see immediate change.
He said things would have been different for the UPND administration had they told Zambians the truth that the road to economic recovery would be tough therefore they should tighten their belts.
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