UPND in leadership crisis, says Dr Canisius Banda

Mon, 15 May 2017 12:45:13 +0000

By AARON CHIYANZO

THE UPND leadership has suffered a mortal blow following the incarceration of its leader Hakainde Hichilema which has left the flock headless and lost, says former vice-president for politics Canisius Banda.

Dr Banda further said the party vice president for administration Geoffrey Bwalya Mwamba was now exhibiting cowardice.

He said that even now Mr Hichilema despite being in prison still had all the power over the UPND while Mr Mr Mwamba was not doing anything.

“In a curious case of parallelism, as my late wife’s body was being lowered into the grave two years ago, I turned to Hichilema and advised him to groom a successor or successors. Leadership requires that” he said.

Dr Banda said that Mr Mwamba did not fit in that bill, as even his whereabouts now were not known as he was busy exhibiting cowardice.

“This is the time GBM should rise to the occasion by judiciously acting as president and making his party behave as is required of an opposition party,” he advised

He said that it was a shame that the UPND had abandoned Mr Hichilema at the time when he needed them the most.

He reiterated that leadership in the opposition UPND was threatened and that members should just rally behind their leader in incarceration.

Dr Banda said that authority for leadership in the UPND was over centralized and that all power was with Mr Hichilema.

Dr Banda charged that if Mr Hichilema could not govern the UPND from jail, then nobody would and the UPND flock would remain lost.

Dr Banda said that the UPND at the moment was behaving as if it was on recess and like an illegal entity.

He reiterated that the incarceration of Mr Hichilema had decapitated the UPND, needlessly and had caused confusion among its members.

Dr Banda advised the UPND membership to ensure that the party continued to exist because its future did not lie on Mr Hichilema alone.

“The future of the UPND lies on intelligently harnessing the existing talents and passion of its members within it. It lies in the required diffusion of power, from the centre to its peripheral organs” he said.

Dr Banda charged that the peripheral organs of the UPND at the moment were incapable of original leadership thinking, a malignant condition which was both a source and result of intra-party tyranny and dictatorship.

“It is my prayer that the pain Hichilema is feeling now will bring him closer to God and transform him into the kind of leader that leadership dictates” he said.