By GIDEON NYENDWA
THERE was no alliance that was formed by opposition leaders that met on last Friday in Lusaka but there was an agreement to work together on matters of common interest, Patriotic Front (PF) acting president Given Lubinda has said.
Mr Lubinda said he invited the opposition leaders for lunch and during that time they agreed that it was high time they started looking at matters of common interest.
He said once they discovered any issues of common interest they should rally behind them together but there was no alliance that was formed.
“There is no opposition alliance that was formed, the only known alliance in this country is the UPND Alliance and there is no other,” he said.
Mr Lubinda said what they agreed with other opposition leaders was that they would meet regularly and even if UPND was to invite them to go and wine and dine they would surely do that without any objection.
He also said that each and every political party has qualified members who were competing to be appointed to the civil service and there was nothing wrong if the party in power had such people and appointed them to the civil service.
Mr Lubinda said there was nothing wrong even in the UPND appointing some of the people who were qualified to government because they were qualified and there was no need to politic about that.
But, he said, what the people talk about was taking people who have no qualification and appointing them to government positions.
Mr Lubinda said the opposition was willing to offer credible checks and balances to the government because the inexperience of the UPND regime had started showing.
He said he was happy that the PF members of parliament have been consistent in offering checks and balances the way they prevented the government from breaching the constitution when they quoted the old constitution to support their budget.
“And they were punished for that,” he said.
