BY GABRIEL MIYANDA
1. If a manifesto is defined as a road map of what a party intends to do, with what resources, when and with what results, then the 20 page 2021 – 2026 paper which has been present and issued by the UPND cannot meet the criteria of a manifesto. Instead the so-called manifesto is presented as a set of resolutions which do not tell us how they intend to have such resolutions implemented.
2. The UPND paper does not present the priorities of what they intend to do to convise the Zambian people neither does it present anything new. What they have presented is a number of topics which are shallow and devoid of analysis. They are merely a hodgepodge of ideals that are incomplete.
3. Some of the issues which they say they will attend to do are already implemented by the current government or in the process of implementation eg page 12 on manufacturing, page 13 on education and page 14 on Health care system.
4. It is a shame that critical issues like Gender equality, support to the youth and persons with disabilities are all covered scantly and grouped in less than a page. This shows that they have no vision for youths, women and persons with disabilities of Zambia except for using youths as demonstrators and tools of violence as it has been their culture. Nowhere in their document have they referred to the need to provide space for the youths, women and persons with disabilities to be represented in parliament (remember that they opposed provision of empowering marginalized groups that was contained in Bill 10.
5. Among the astonishing suggestions they have made in their so-called manifesto most of which contradict the well-known position of UPND are as follows:
I. They plan to build international Airports in all the 10 provinces and yet they opposed the building of infrastructures and the establishment of the national airline by the PF government. In deed nowhere in there document are they acknowledging the massive developmental projects rolled out countrywide which everybody acknowledges.
II. On what they proposed as their reform of the pension scheme on page 17 “All of Zambia’s pension schemes are deficient in design, financing, and administration. As a result, a lot of retirees some of them who retire at senior management levels become destitute upon retirement simply because the Zambian Pension system is faulty.” For how long will some of the leaders of this party who participated in killing the pension schemes will they continue to fool the people of Zambia? Have Zambians forgotten some of those who took advantage of the privatization scheme who have left many Zambia pensioners destitute?
III. On mining on page 11 they say, “Put in place a policy and plan to facilitate local ownership and increased participation of Zambian players in the industry” yet the leader of this part has said it categorically that Zambians have no capacity to run the mines which is false.
IV. On their page 16 says “Revive the process of expanding the Bill of Rights to integrate Economic, Social and Cultural Rights” which they opposed in the 2016 referendum. Is it not paradoxical that UPND can state that they want to re-introduce the bill right?
V. Is it not paradoxical again for the UPND document to be in favour of decentralization when they have been opposing the establishment of new districts and support to chiefs who are part of good governance as shown on their page16.
VI. The campaign pictures on pages 19 and 20 are centred on the one man leadership which is a clear indication that all is centred on him alone as a leader and the party has nothing to show to the people of Zambia what it can do and what it has done.
6. Nowhere in this document have they mentioned their sources of revenue for the state beyond tax
7. What the document has stated about foreign policy of the UPND have left us wondering if they understand what foreign policy is all about and what has happened in Zambia’s foreign policy since independence see on their page 18.
8. Above all this document does not recognize the devastating impact of the Corona virus on the Economy, companies and people’s lives not only Zambia but Globally.
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