Socialist Party General Secretary Dr Cosmas Musumali says the Patriotic Front has resorted to peddling falsehoods about ethnicity, tribalism and other narrow issues because it does not have an agenda for the country.
And Dr Musamali says the wide frustration and annoyance amongst Zambian citizens is because of high levels of injustice, inequity and the lack of peace in the entire country due to the kind of politics being practiced.
In a statement yesterday, Dr Musumali noted that the issues of tribalism religion, aspects of satanism were political matters that were being peddled by politicians who do not have a proper agenda for the country.
“The critical question being posed is that why are Zambians unhappy? Why are Zambians annoyed? Zambians are generally angry today, more than ever before in the history of this country. The quick explanation is that the high levels of injustice, the high levels of inequity and the apparent lack of peace in our country today is a critical issue. It is the driving force behind the anger and the frustration of our masses with the Zambian politics. The danger in this is that the masses are becoming cynical, they don’t believe the leadership anymore. The leadership in Zambia doesn’t have the message for the masses. Because it doesn’t have the message, it hides the class nature, class conflict that’s so perseverance today in Zambian societies. And this leadership, because it lacks the content, it lacks the substantive issues that it should bring to the masses, it’s resorting to agendas that are very narrow,” Dr Musumali said.
He accused the PF government of using divisive agenda’s of tribalism, ethnicity and tribalism to shield their lack of vision for the country.
“One agenda that we often hear of is the agenda about ethnicity. The issue of tribalism is political, it is being caused by politicians that don’t have a proper agenda for this country. The issue of religion, in some cases aspects of satanism keeps of resurfacing. The issue of who is Zambian and who is not Zambian keeps on coming up all the time, whenever a leader emerges and we have issues of race that have been thrown out there. These issues are very divisive, and of late we hear of issues of sexual orientation. Zambians are very sensitive to these issues, they are raised in order to to cover up the lack of content, the lack of a political will on behalf of the masses and people are becoming literary very annoyed with their politicians. So if Zambians get frustrated, sooner or later, their participation in our politics is going to wither, just because we are not carrying the appropriate message to the masses,” Dr Musumali warned.
Meanwhile, Dr Musumali said the politics being practiced in Zambia could not change if citizens were not educated about the effects of the capitalist governance which the PF had been using.
“Can the politics change? The answer is no, the system of capitalism that we have today in Zambia is designed in such a way that they can’t tell the truth. They don’t talk of this system being exploitative, they can’t talk of this system lacking justice. This system can only be maintained on the basis of state sponsored violence. There is no other way around it and that’s the message that they can’t openly tell the masses. And to hide that fact, they go to very divisive issues, they go to petty issues that at the end of the day preoccupy the media,” observed Dr Musumali.
