DON’T be scared of arrest, Hakainde Hichilema is coming to arrest the dead economy and not you, UPND spokesperson Cornelius Mweetwa tells the PF.
Mweetwa, the party’s Choma Central parliamentary candidate, says Zambians are being called to duty to rescue the country using the ballot on August 12.
Addressing the press on Saturday in Livingstone, Mweetwa said Hichilema would not create new laws targeting his PF political opponents.
“HH is coming to resurrect the economy of the country. He is not coming to arrest you, the way you are damn scared. He is coming to arrest the dead economy. That is his programme number one,” he told the PF. “But for you who have been stealing, who have been flouting the law, HH has nothing to do with you. The laws in place will deal with you. The laws that are already in place will take care of you. HH is not coming to create new laws. Laws are there to govern the country, so they must apply equally. So no one should be scared.”
Mweetwa said it would not be as bad as people think, “because we want a fresh start”.
“Under the fresh start, there are things you do to ensure that a country heals and rebuilds. You can’t arrest people anyhow. You can’t rebuild the country like that. So no need to be worried like they are,” he said.
However, Mweetwa appealed to the PF to start preparing to leave office smoothly in the next 60 days or so adding that they will not be the first ones to leave office.
He said even the UPND-Alliance would have to leave office at some time after winning the August 12 elections.
Mweetwa also called on the Ministry of Energy to explain the fuel shortages that are being experienced in the country.
“We are asking the Ministry of Energy to come out in the open and assure the nation about the fuel situation because fuel lubricates the economy. When you begin seeing fuel shortages then it means the economy of the country has ground to a halt. So this fuel shortage is not just in Livingstone,” he said. “What is going on? Instead of wasting tax payers’ money Inonge Wina flying around with Professor [Nkandu] Luo which is an abuse of tax payers’ money, tell us what is happening to the fuel. You should know that those people who are spending long times on queues will not vote for you.”
Mweetwa also said the PF government had introduced a tax waiver on edible oil just to try to shield the cost of living which has skyrocketed.
“They are now allowing people who are importing cocking oil into the country to bring it tax free so that its cost should not reflect the economic value. And interestingly this waiver is only up to October because elections will be over. So the real prices will resurface in October,” he said. “These are warnings….in 2016 they did reduce cost of fuel and ZNBC went on the streets to get a follow up from motorists…After the elections the fuel prices went up.”
On the state of the UPND-Alliance, Mweetwa said the alliance campaigns across the country are going on very well according to plan.
He said it was known that as camping period kicks off, the PF government was going to start political gymnastics to block the opposition from canvassing for votes.
“The PF are in a desperate gear. They don’t sleep well, and they are suffering from political diarrhoea and insomnia. They can’t sleep,” he said. “The day of reckoning is just two months away. Zambia will be free again, and Zambia will be better again. And One Zambia One Nation will carry a meaning again. They have had their time, it is over.”
Mweetwa said the PF cannot do politics without talking about of Hichilema because he is the man of the moment.
“HH is the name of the moment. HH is the next president. So they are doing well by talking about him. There cannot be any ZNBC news without HH being talked about. So our campaign is on course,” he said. “People already know what they want to do. They have already made up their mind. They are kicking PF out. So those who were thinking that they can stop rallies, that UPND-Alliance will not campaign, you are daydreaming. All this time we have been campaigning, for the last five years we have been campaigning. We are just concluding our campaigning.”
Mweetwa said the UPND-Alliance would drag the Electoral Commission of Zambia to court over the issue of holding rallies.
But he was quick to state that: “We are now reaching out to more people than when you call for a rally and the people who come there are already the converted.”
“We are now talking to a lot of people even those who did not want to hear our message. But when they hear it they are very happy, so this campaign is a good,” said Mweetwa. “We need good sound systems so that even when people are sleeping, when they hear HH, HH they will start smiling. So this campaign is a sweet campaign and it is working out very well. It is giving us better results than we had imagined. How can one leave their business stands and go to a rally when the economy is biting?”