PF General Secretary’s full address to the Media

1. PREAMBLE

The Patriotic Front, under the leadership of His Excellency President Edgar Chagwa Lungu is united and more determined than ever to strengthen its role as the voice of the people of Zambia, a continued expression of the aspirations of all Citizens for a better life, and particularly of the poor.

2. UPCOMING LOCAL GOVERNMENT ELECTIONS – LAVUSHIMANDA, KANCHIBIYA, LUNTE DISTRICTS AND CENTRAL PROVINCE

The following candidates have therefore been adopted by the PF to contest the Local Government by-elections in their designated areas:

• Muchinga Province

1. 1. Lavushimanda District – Col Peter Chipasha, PF Candidate

   2. Kanchibiya District – Chipalo Mwansa, PF Candidate

• Northern Province

1. 3. Lunte District – Lawrence Chanda, PF Candidate

• Central Province

1. 4. Ithezhi tezhi District – Namakau . A. Kaingu, PF Candidate

   5. Bwacha Constituency (Chililalila Ward) – Edward Phiri, PF Councillor

Allow me to place some emphasis on why we take local government seriously as the Patriotic Front.

The Patriotic Front understands its mandate in advancing people’s power in every community. Local government is indeed in the hands of local citizens.

President Lungu has created new districts, building on our vision to decentralise and bring development closer to the people. It is our commitment to ensure that local government in existing and newly created districts have the capacity to, among other things, do the following:

• Ensure democratic and accountable government for local communities;

• Maximise the provision of services to local communities in a sustainable manner;

• Work for social and economic development;

• Realize a safe and healthy environment;

• Promote the involvement of local communities and community organisations and stakeholders such as the Churches, on matters of local government.

Because of the Patriotic Front, Zambians have the right to directly elect Mayors and Council Chairpersons to represent their aspirations in Councils.

We are therefore asking Zambians in the upcoming Local Government by-elections to place their vote for the PF to ensure that local government works better for the people. PF is the only political party capable of advancing people’s power to determine their own destinies. Those being adopted by the Party in these upcoming by-elections must be held accountable by their districts and reported to the Party. We shall not condone any dismal performance from elected officials.

As Secretary General of the Party, PF remains the people’s movement. It puts people at the centre of its activities. For this reason, we have involved communities in the process of nominating candidates for the forthcoming Local Government by-elections. This has helped in choosing the best candidates to be PF public representatives. We believe that these Council Chairmen must report regularly to communities on their work. This will give power to the people in holding their representatives accountable and making local government work better.

It is only the PF which commits to advancing people’s power in and through local government in this Manifesto. We remain at the service of the people and communities.

2. MEALIE MEAL PRICES

The Patriotic Front is delighted at the continued reduction in the price of the nation’s staple food-mealie meal. We are aware of the challenges facing the smallholder farmers that mainly rely on Government for their sustenance, but we wish to send a word of comfort that Patriotic Front is a friend of the farmer and will take decisions that go to benefit the agriculture sector in the medium to long-term. We have promised an agricultural revolution and we shall deliver on it. I want to ask farmers across the Country to stand with the PF Government as it repositions the agriculture sector as one of the key drivers of the Zambian economy. The market forces in the maize marketing industry must be allowed in order to arrive at a balance. Together, we must work towards finding sustainable measures to make our agricultural sector great!

As the Patriotic Front, we are extremely proud and delighted to note that the mealie-meal prices have continued to drop from a high of K100 per 25 kilogramme bag of breakfast meal in January to K58 currently.

Reports from various parts of the country bear testimony to the fact that mealie meal is becoming more and more affordable. As a Party that is pro-poor, we will not relent in our quest to ensure that every person is able to have a decent life where they can afford to put food on their tables. We celebrate the good policies that have seen a reduction in the shelf price of mealie-meal, we cannot help but stand with our hardworking farmers that produce the maize needed to make mealie-meal. We know that the FRA did the best they could to see to it that we somehow have a win-win situation between the farmers and themselves. The least we can assure the farmers is that, our government will stand by them no matter what happens,”

3. FUEL PRICE REDUCTION.

The Patriotic Front party wishes to thank the Energy Regulation Board(ERB) for a timely reduction in pump price of Fuel, the party is alive to the fact that the wheels of production, service delivery and distribution of goods and services is largely dependent on fuel. We are therefore excited about the reduction in the prices of diesel, petrol and kerosene.

It would be a misnomer for the price of fuel to remain the same while one of the fundamental factors that affects the price of the commodity, the currency exchange rate, has hugely stabilised. In this regard, allow me to commend the central bank for keeping the economic fundamentals such as inflation, lending rates and exchange rate in check.

There is therefore no doubt that the reduction of fuel prices will benefit all – from the barber man who uses diesel for his revenue-generating activity, to the farmer who transports farm produce to the market and the consumer will buy essential commodities at the cheap price.

Yes, the reduction may seem to be marginal but the benefits to the working class who have to go to work and back home will eventually have a reasonable saving to spend on other households essentials, for example, if one uses 20 litres of petrol to go to work per day and was spending K 250 , the same person will spend k 233.4 a saving of K 16.6 per day, that is a K498.00 monthly saving on fuel!

We are also aware that the reduction also has a positive impact on the manufacturing industry especially those that use generators in the production of goods. We are confident that with the positive economic outlook and the projected economic growth of 4.2 percent for 2017, there will be a further reduction in fuel prices that will also see a further increase in saving by vehicle owners, a reduction in the cost of production and a decrease in the cost of doing business – all this will bring commodity prices further down and subsequently improve the living standards of our people. This has a further multiplier effect of increasing the productivity capacity of the firms and hence increase the capacity of firms to hire more labour and increasing employment opportunities for all citizens.

The PF is excited by the efforts of the Central Bank in helping to maintain economic fundamentals right through their monetary policy. This is important because the PF as a pro-poor political party, all policies of Government must be aimed at poverty reduction through job creation.

The Party is also happy that its government is fulfilling one of its important programmes of ‘industrialisation ‘as contained in the party manifesto of 2016 to 2021 through creation of a conducive environment for investment. On this note, the PF is encouraging all stakeholders dealing with public financial management systems to continue maintaining fiscal discipline in order to grow the economy to greater heights.

4. BOZ REDUCTION OF BOTH POLICY RATE AND RESERVE RATIOS

The Patriotic Front has welcomed the reduction in both the policy rate and the reserve ratios by the Bank of Zambia. The measure is in tandem with the aspirations of the 2016-2021 election manifesto. The ruling party therefore commends the monetary policy committee of the Bank of Zambia for reducing the policy rate and the statutory reserve ratios. The Party is elated by the fact that every growing economy in the world has a wide base of successful small and medium enterprises.

The party also believes that the two measures that have been reduced by the bank of Zambia will bolster economic growth by reducing the crowding out effect of the central government and giving banks and non-bank financial institutions added latitude to lend to all sector of the economy.

Let me observe as follows:

(A). REDUCED POLICY RATE: as a monetary benchmark, this measure announced by Bank of Zambia will increase commercial banks liquidity and will in turn lend more to small and medium enterprises at reduced lending rate which in turn will increase their economic activities, and when they engage in more economic activities, they will employ more workers in their production lines, when this happens, they will produce mores goods for export and eventually earn foreign currency and that will strengthen our kwacha. The party is aware that a strong kwacha will make imports cheaper because few kwacha will be needed to buy dollars, meaning that our people will buy imported goods that are not produced by the local manufacturers cheaply , this will of course improve the quality of life and increased jobs for our youths and women.

B. REDUCED RESERVE RATIO: The Patriotic Front is excited with the reduced reserve ratio as commercial banks are now required to only keep a reduced proportion of their clients’s deposits as reserve with the Bank of Zambia, allowing commercial banks more money to lend to small and medium enterprises; the PF is happy that there will be increased liquidity in the economy as a result of this measure, and that it will further work to reduce the interest rates by the commercial banks.

Allow me to take this opportunity and appeal to the banks to quickly respond to the gesture by the Bank of Zambia by passing the benefits of the monetary policy changes to reduce the interest rates and lend more money to small and medium enterprises for investment. Existing and emerging entrepreneurs must feel the benefits of these measures in the economy.

Let me also call on the business community, especially the small and medium enterprises to seriously bargain with banks for lower interest rates for them to grow their businesses so as to compete with relatively larger businesses and benefit from government’s intervention through the bank of Zambia.

The Patriotic Front is confident that commercial banks will take advantage of the two monetary policies to lend more to their clients especially the Small and Medium Enterprises (SME’s). As the ruling Party, we are also calling on all Zambians to support locally manufactured products as a sure way of growing the economy. This is a way of increasing the productivity sector of the economy hence increasing the industrialization capacity in line with the aspirations and manifesto of the PF.

The Party also commends the Ministry of Finance for their guidance to the Bank of Zambia and further encourages the team to continue steering the economy to higher heights.

5. POLITICAL STATEMENT

1. The Public Order Act – The Party has submitted to the Zambia Centre for Interparty Dialogue (ZCID) and our position is that the piece of legislation maintains the status quo for the time being. Of course, no piece of legislation is cast in stone – there will always be room for modification in future as and when amendments are proposed.

2. Political Parties Bill – The Party is studying the Bill with keen interest and making consultations. An official position will be communicated at an opportune time.

3. Hon Chishimba Kambwili’s decision to challenge the expulsion in Court:

The PF is itching to defend Roan Constituency and to put someone’s self-proclaimed popularity to test. It does not matter in what form or shape they come, they shall fall. The PF will emerge victorious because the people of Luanshya know that service and not self-centred politics is what they deserve.

We are happy that he has apologized for his insults against the Tonga tribe. His number one enemy is his mouth. It remains for him to apologize for his blasphemous statement against the Lord Jesus Christ, something he should have done in the first place.

Let me take this opportunity to warn Hon Kambwili that the Party, including youth and women, will not take kindly to his childish and provocative remarks targeted at President Lungu. He has the freedom to differ with President Lungu and not to become personally disagreeable. Let him take this warning seriously otherwise he will find it very difficult to practice his politics if that is the route he seeks to take. PF is above petty politics, but if he seeks provocative politics, he’ll have his greatest regret very soon.

The Party is ready to defend its action against expelled Roan Member of Parliament Hon Chishimba Kambwili in Court. To this effect, the Party has retained the services of the following in this matter:

1. Mr. Eric Silwamba, SC, of Eric Silwamba and Co

2. Mr. Bonaventure Mutale, SC, of Ellis and Co

3. Mr. Simwanza Lungu

CONCLUSION

I am calling on all members of the PF to defend the unity and integrity of the Party and its principles, and defeat any tendency towards disruption and factionalism.

The party must be able to anchor government implementation of development programs and this will only happen when we have improved the commitment, quality and depth of our members at all levels.

All structures across the country, without exception must remain in constant touch with different sectors of the community through campaigns and programmes that seek to respond to local concerns. We must continue with our relevance at every stage.

I am directing the Youth and Women league of the Party to recruit and train new members and convert them into enthusiastic volunteers and activists, and thus help to renew the party.

Lastly, we remain grateful to all the people of Zambia for their patience and continued support to the patriotic front party.

Thank you!