UPND vice-president Geoffrey Bwalya Mwamba says elections are close and the opposition party is heating up to remove the PF from office.

And Mwamba has asked Zambians to vote for rich people because their primary purpose is not to steal.

In an interview, Saturday, GBM said not even flimsy arrests would slow down their party.

“No one will slow us down. In fact, we are heating up. Whether rearrested again, we don’t care. But if you look at most cases, the state has dropped them, we have been acquitted and so on. So that clearly shows that the government was just trying to be vindictive on the opposition or probably to slow us but in my view, that will not slow us. Whether arrested or not arrested, we shall continue with our programs. 2018 actually, we are going closer to elections so I think we should heat up in terms of mobilising our members,” GBM said.

And GBM said it was better to vote for rich people because their preoccupation was not to enrich themselves.

“My advise to the Zambian people is that in the next election, they should vote for leadership that they think will look after them, which is UPND. There is no other party that will look after them. Sometimes, people don’t want leadership that they feel that they are rich but I’ll tell you, look at what has happened now in South Africa, the anchors now decided to pick on a leader like Cyril Ramaphosa who is one of the richest Africans because they know that when he gets into power, he will not go and steal their money,” he said.

“This is the same thing that I am appealing to Zambians that those who are rich, those who are comfortable, their priority is not to come and make themselves rich, they are already rich, all they want is to leave a legacy. All they want is to see that everyone gets a fair share of their cake.”

Meanwhile, GBM said corruption was not a new phenomenon in the PF government.

“I am not surprised [that Harry Kalaba resigned]. Even the time that I resigned in 2013, I will tell you, it’s just that I didn’t want to be talking about corruption but corruption right now just reached unprecedented levels. Corruption has been there but now it is something that no one can control because the President, Edgar Lungu is also corrupt. Why is he failing to fire his ministers? I think a few months ago he was on Zambian TV telling the Zambians that he is going to deal with those corrupt ministers of his. Up to today, he only fired Kambwili because Kambwili is also trying to contest the presidency. Other than that, he has not fired anyone. There is so much corruption. Look at the road itself, the one the president was talking about, the dual carriage way from Lusaka into Ndola, how can it cost $1.2 billion?” asked GBM.

“If that money was pumped into the economy, this country would turn around, everyone would be smiling but today look at Zambians, no one is smiling today, everyone is miserable. Look at the streets now, they were saying that Hakainde Hichilema when he comes into power he will chase the street vendors but it is the other way round. They have duped the street vendors, they promised that street vendors would be kept in the streets but they have all been kicked out now. I hope Zambians have learnt something but Zambians easily forget. But come 2021, they won’t forget. They will remember that this party, PF is a party of liars. They duped them, they told them that they would have more money in their pockets, do they have money in their pockets? They have no money in their pockets.”