Rainbow Party general secretary Wynter Kabimba says the only way to unite the country is to accept that there is already a President in State House.

Speaking when he featured on United Voice radio’s ‘Add your Voice’ programme, Wednesday, Kabimba said even if people did not like President Edgar Lungu, it was important to accept that he was Head of State.

“I said one of the things that we need do to unify ourselves across political divide is stop using strong language against one another is to stop insulting one another. I will not engage President Lungu if he is insulting me, why should I engage him? He has no respect for me, he doesn’t think that I matter. So if his approach to speak to me is to insult me [then] I will not engage him. Even if you invited me to a national dialogue, I will not go there and vice versa. So we can only unify the country if we accept that there is a president now in State House. We may not like him, we may not agree with Lungu, that is a different issue,” Kabimba said.

“So when it comes to programmes like these [and] I’m hoping that the state intelligence are recording this and they can take it to him and say ‘this is what Mr Kabimba is proposing as Rainbow Party general secretary’ and if he sees that my proposal can advance this party, he is going to get that proposal and implement it. I don’t need to go to State House and have tea with him, no. When I come here, I am talking to President Lungu through this radio station and I am speaking to all the Zambians.”

Asked if he would accept an invitation to have a cup of tea with President Lungu, Kabimba replied in the affirmative.

“I will go and see him as long as that cup of tea is on issues that are in the national interest. I will go and see him. There is no covert and I have never sworn to God that I will never speak to President Lungu. [Ever since I left PF, I have never spoken to him. The only time that I spoke to him was at the funeral of late Daniel Munkombwe. [the conversation] went very well, we hugged each other, ‘bwanji, bwanji, long time’ we used Nyanja,” Kabimba said.

And Kabimba wondered why some oil supplying companies that were proved to be corrupt during President Michael Sata’s regime were still allowed to supply the commodity.

“The second area of corruption and again we have evidence for it as Rainbow party, is in the area of oil supply and procurement. And the reason why I say that is because in 2013, President Sata appointed me to chair the Energy Regulation Board Commission of Inquiry and we found that that area is flout with corruption. And what is saddening me is that the same companies that we found that time as being in engaged in corruption are still the ones that are supplying fuel to Zambia today. And I have challenged the PF government, I have challenged President Edgar Lungu that ‘if what I am saying is not correct, release the Energy Regulation Board Commission of Inquiry.’ What I know is that our commission presented the report to the president (Sata), the report I am told it was referred to the Ministry of Energy and the Ministry of Energy was supposed to do a cabinet memo to bring it to cabinet and then after that it would be released,” Kabimba explained.

Kabimba also denied speculations that he was too soft on President Lungu.

“As Rainbow Party, we are dealing with substantive issues and we are using the evidence. We are dealing with issues that are evidence based and so when it comes to areas where we have no evidence, you shall not hear the Rainbow party comment. It doesn’t matter whom it affects and that is what they mean by saying ‘I’m soft on President Lungu and the PF,’ [but] I’m not soft. I want to be a leader that can guide my country in ensuring that we discuss issues in the most objective manner,” Kabimba said.

Responding to calls by many that opposition political parties should form an alliance and kick out PF from Government, Kalaba said it was not possible due to different ideologies.

“[On opposition collision] this is a mistake that we make in this country. This is not about saying ‘just come together and remove PF.’ In 1991, we removed Kaunda, the MMD group were thieves. We removed Kaunda [but] did we solve the problem? No. In 2011, we removed the MMD. Is this country any better? We didn’t solve the problem, we still have issues of corruption, lack of water, fuel increments, people have no food but we removed Rupiah Banda in 2011. So this is not just about removing the individual or a group of individuals” said Kabimba.

“Why is it that you tell us as politicians to come together [but] you don’t tell the churches to form one church? Why is it that you don’t tell the UCZ, the Catholics, the Pentecostal and the Jehovah’s Witness and say ‘the number of churches has increased come together and form one church’ why is that only applicable to politics? You don’t do that because the doctrine in each church differs from one another. So even for us politicians it’s the same. All these parties are Zambian but we differ in the way we want to manage this country so that people can live happily. And that is why you must listen to the politicians when they come on these programmes.”