Patriotic Front media director Sunday Chanda says President Edgar Lungu does not engage in politics of empty boasting because he is a man who identifies himself with the poor.

In apparent reference to Roan PF member of parliament Chishimba Kambwili’s remarks on the Head of State’s wealth, Chanda told journalists at a PF Interactive Forum on Sunday that President Lungu was not interested in playing ‘ping pong’ with those who were bent on attacking him.

“I think it is important to say that His Excellency the President means differently to different people and in meaning different things to different people, His Excellency the President in certain circles is known as the son of Amai (Mrs) Jere, the son of a marketeer who struggled so hard to fight for her son to get his education into the law school. He was one of the best students and a successful lawyer, a man who has spent a great life with the people of Chawama as their representative but what the President of the Republic of Zambia is not, is that he is not the metal scrap dealer whose business saw a sharp rise in the 1990s in Chingola and Luanshya and a sharp rise of the scrap metal business dealer corresponding even with a spate of increasing murder cases of mining guards, that is not President Lungu,” Chanda said.

“President Lungu is not the man who built mansions on a golf course in Luanshya, President Lungu is not the man who privatized our mines and our companies and made a fortune out of it, that is not him. President Lungu is not a man who practices politics of braggadocio that he can have breakfast in London and have lunch in Lusaka. President Lungu is a leader who identifies himself with the poor people of Zambia and who has remained true to the founding principles and values of the Patriotic Front (PF) in serving the people of Zambia and I think over and above, President Lungu remains issue based, he is not the type that would want to play to the gallery and play ping pong. His mandate is to deliver on the aspirations of the Zambian people.”

Chanda said President Lungu was not elected to be responding to criticism coming from people who could not account for their wrong doings.

“We wish to place on record that we have seen attempts from certain political colleagues who would want to get so personal and attack the President to the point of insulting him and dragging his name in the mud. From the side of the Patriotic Front, we find these politics to be highly uncivilized and the people of Zambia did not elect President Lungu to answer to men who walk like models or men who cannot account for some of the things that have happened in their lives and also in the lives of those that are associated with them,” Chanda said.

“The people of Zambia require that our politics ought to be mature and substantive in nature, that the opposition can provide checks and balances and that we can differ with the opposition without essentially becoming personally disagreeable, I think that this is what the people of Zambia are demanding of us. The people of Zambia are demanding the President to show the works, to deliver, to do that road from Lusaka to Ndola, a dual carriage way and to bring that hospital closer to them, that is what the people of Zambia are asking for.”

Chanda also said that President Lungu had not grown big headed after becoming Head of State because he understood where he was coming from.

“Whether or not President Lungu once lived in a garage, that is what shows that this is a type of leader that the Zambian people have entrusted with their day to day welfare to run the affairs on their behalf and he remains this humble and a simple story. And we are so glad that to this point, his Excellency the President has not been intoxicated by power. We have seen some of our colleagues who are insulting him that with an opportunity of just being appointed cabinet Minister, no body, not even people from the media could even cough, all because power went up to their head and they are better off here doing what they are doing at the expense of being with their life partners who need them the most at a critical hour as this,” said Chanda.