It’s said that if you want to hide information away from an African, hide it in a book. The reason is simple……we either have a poor reading culture…..or don’t even bother to read at all!
This is probably the reason why immediate past president, Edgar Chagwa Lungu; typical of him as a sly and cunning politician, finds it convenient for him to sneak in lies and propaganda in his political discourse, every so often, to achieve the objective of deliberately misleading the masses in his quest to bounce back to power using hook or crook!
During his so-called address to the nation the other day, ba Lungu had the following questions for his successor, “What did he find when he assumed office? What was the price of mealie-meal? Fuel? Electricity? Fertilizer?Cooking oil? Sugar? Volatile exchange rate?”
Since it would be folly for the President to waste time responding to such innuendos as he’s focussing on resuscitating an economy which is in a comma, we shall seek to provide answers to the above by providing a comparative analysis of the performance of our economy from the tenure of the Movement for Multiparty Democracy (MMD), the Patriotic Front (PF) right through to the current administration.
MMD deposed the mighty United Nation Independence Party (UNIP) from power in 1991 on the backdrop of economic malaise, food shortages coupled with sky-rocketing prices of essential commodities.
By the time citizens resolved to seek a ‘divorce’ from MMD and flushed the proverbial “red card” after a union dating back to 2 decades; the Rupiah Bwezani Banda administration would leave behind a buoyant economy – affordable prices of essential commodities, a stronger currency and of course, stable inflation.
Consider the economic outlook below as the country headed towards the 2011 general elections:
| MMD | Quantity | Price/Rate |
| Fertilizer | 50Kg | 200 |
| Mealie meal | 25Kg | 35 |
| Sugar | 2Kg | 18 |
| Fuel | 1l | 8 |
| Bread | Loaf | 5 |
| Exchange rate | $US | 4.7 |
| Inflation | % | 3.3 |
The Micheal C. Sata led Patriotic Front (PF) ‘stormed’ the political scene with a convincing slogan: “more money in people’s pockets, more jobs and lower taxes!”
However, barely 10 years in power, citizens had had enough of PF. Caderism, stagnating economy, rampant corruption and gassing of innocent citizens during their sleep etc was too much for them to bear. They would turn-up in record numbers and say “zwaa” to ba Lungu (give him marching orders!)
The following table definitely indicates that ba Lungu left the state of the economy in intensive care…..worse than what they inherited from MMD:
| PF | Quantity | Price/Rate |
| Fertilizer | 50Kg | 650 |
| Mealie meal | 25Kg | 139 |
| Sugar | 2Kg | 35 |
| Fuel | 1l | 17 |
| Bread | Loaf | 15 |
| Exchange rate | $US | 18 |
| Inflation | % | 22 |
UPND has been at the helm for merely 3 years. The ongoing war in Ukraine which has seen the disruption of supply chains such as crude oil, fertilizer and the grain, and obviously the effect of climate change which has exacerbated power supply hasn’t worked in favour of the Hakainde Hichilema led New Dawn Administration. This has given the opposition, particularly ba Lungu a blank cheque to mercilessly and viciously attack the government or indeed mislead the public that UPND has lamentably failed to meet the aspirations of our people.
However, if we take into account the state of our economy today compared to what they found in place, UPND is definitely on course to take our people to the Promised Land. Consider the prevailing economic environment in our country at the moment:
| UPND | Quantity | Price/Rate |
| Fertilizer | 50Kg | 925 |
| Mealie meal | 25Kg | 370 |
| Sugar | 2Kg | 66 |
| Fuel | 1l | 30 |
| Bread | Loaf | 25 |
| Exchange rate | $US | 26 |
| Inflation | % | 2.5 |
Finally, we’d like to present to you our esteemed readers a comparative analysis of price increases, exchange rates and state of inflation during the rule of all the 3 regimes. For the record, we must confess we didn’t rely on our own humble wisdom to arrive at these figures. We had to engage an expert, whom we shall simply refer to as Munsanje, to help us work-out the figures and present water tight facts to the public:
| Item | % increase | |
| MMD to PF | PF to UPND | |
| Fertilizer – 50Kg | 225% | 42% |
| Mealie meal – 25Kg | 297% | 166% |
| Sugar – 2Kg | 94% | 60% |
| Fuel -1l | 113% | 65% |
| Bread – loaf | 200% | 133% |
| Exchange rate $US | 260% | 44% |
| Inflation – % | 18.7 | -19.5 |
As they say, figures don’t lie. We shall leave it upto you dear readers to judge for yourselves as to who really messed-up our beloved nation.
Prince Bill M. Kaping’a
National Coordinator – HH Mpaka 2031 People’s Alliance
Yeah, figures don’t lie, but liars do figure! The inflation figure for UPND doesn’t look right.
Anyways, the sooner you stop talking about “ba Lungu”, the less and less he will become a factor in our daily lives.
Ugly articles from Hamasaka.
Who will read all that rubbish? Not retarded Edgar will read these garbage.
Just work as you promised not doing the oposit of what u promised to do like you are doing.
They are trying to rubbish your posting because they hate facts. They also hate being reminded where we are coming from, very much typical of people who don’t like dealing from an objective point of view. You just don’t sort out from a vacuum. ECL made comparisons without data but when someone brings out the same comparisons but with data, you don’t like it? Zambia will never improve with these mindsets. Development always involves the past, the present and the future.
The mistake of upnd and their praise singers is to continue making PF as thier reference point. if PF was that bad, why should a notmal person want to compare with them? lets judge upnd on promises they made. who promised a dollar to zmk14? who promised fertilizer @200, mealiemeal@50? when u find the answer, go and tell the person to fulfil those promised.
Is it not your ECL who made PF the reference point for his comparison? When others answer back with data your smart rhetoric is ” praise singers”. Yes some of us praise the meal allowances, praise increased CDF, praise increased recruitment across the civil service, but we don’t praise the shortage of medicines, neither do we praise the fuel increases and in the cost of living, but when you consider debt, retirees, council workers that were not being paid, we do understand that these challenges will take long to resolve.
When we criticise them and some people do, it’s not because of bitterness but wanting the right thing for the country.
Yes, figures don’t lie.ecl cdf only k1600000, hh cdf k36, 000,000, ecl average school grants K1000, HH school grants quarterly, k15,000, ecl meal allowanced to students K0.00 hh zangena, ecl employment of civil servants 0.001% hh 25%, ecl payment of dues to retirees, zero, hh all, ecl funding to
INFLATION is a RATE, this means it is the speed at which prices are changing. Edgar Lungu left prices changing at 22 km per hour. Which means that after every hour the distance prices had covered was 22 km. So, if he had remained in power, prices would have now reached the moon. UPND slowed down the speed to less than 10 km per hour. Prices were ALREADY high with Lungu and were going to increase at a faster rate, but HH came in and slowed down the rate at which the already high prices would rise.
ECONOMICS 101. But I know that Edgar Chagwa Lungu got 9F in GCSE Mathematics.
Oh no it’s this useless cadre again ask HH to give you a job