PF Media Director Sunday Chanda says the PF is still Zambia’s number one political party of choice despite losing the Roan Parliamentary seat to Chishimba Kambwili’s NDC candidate.

And Chanda says the party has noted annoyance from members regarding the loss, promising that the party will introspect and come up with solutions.

Speaking when he featured on 5 FM’s Burning Issue program, Tuesday, Chanda said the PF was the only party with a solid manifesto and ability to deliver development to all parts of the country.

“This election is behind us, the introspection has been called by party president Mr Edgar Lungu who is also Republican President. Part of that introspection is that members of the party have pronounced themselves, they have announced their annoyance, we also have sympathizers of the PF who have spoken out on this particular matter, we also have critics who have spoken out. The duty of the party is to gather all these submissions and use them as resource for introspection. We are going to ensure that we remove the steam and pick out the issues,” Chanda said.

“The introspection that party president and Head of State has called for is one that says; ‘where did we make a mistake or mistakes? And to summon our courage to say ‘we must correct these mistakes’. So we will be very hard on ourselves. But the assurance that can be given out there is that the PF remains Zambia’s number one party of choice. The PF remains the only party with a solid manifesto; the PF remains the only party that can take development to all corners of the country. And sometimes it’s possible for colleagues to react from a point of fear, but you know that when you react out of fear you lose objectivity.”

Chanda said the NDC would not have won the Roan seat without the support of UPND.

“My elder brother, Mr Kambwili for some reasons feels that he has earned bragging rights, the fact is that even when he says ‘I have won’ you know very well that if you didn’t have your Alliance partners coming to join you, you were not going to win that seat,” Chanda said.

He said the party would go back to Roan to reorganise itself and reclaim the seat during the next election.

“The clarion call coming from the leadership of the party to the general membership is that time has come for us to summon our courage and to speak to ourselves that we are not the called the PF for nothing. We have won battles before, we are going to match into roan constituency and we are going to ensure that we reclaim that seat to ourselves because we believe it rightfully belongs to us. We are not going to go into Roan with empty words, we are going to go and honour the previous promises that we made,” Chanda said.

Meanwhile, Chanda said people who had left the PF were free to rejoin but the party would not force anyone to do so.

“Politics are so dynamic and the golden rule is that there are no permanent enemies. What the party will not do, however, is to drag individuals and say ‘you come back to PF. The constitution confers on every individual the freedom of association, when people join political parties, they do so on voluntary basis. The PF is like an open cheque, it has continued welcoming people that had gone away and came back, the case of mayor of Lusaka Mr Miles Sampa and Mr Mulenga Sata. There are people who left when they thought that the party was heading to extinction but they came back,” Chanda said.

And Chanda insisted that the party did not send the thugs who were threatening Kambwili and insulting his mother in a video.

“That video showing those people insulting Mr Kambwili and his mother, was criminal. We can differ with Mr Kambwili on issues, but no one has the right to insult his mother because Mr. Kambwili’s mother is my mother, his mother is our mother. Those people were not sent by the party leadership, the party has pronounced itself, party Secretary General has pronounced himself that the police should take action against those people. If we are going to differ with Mr Kambwili, we will differ on issues, if we are going to reconcile with Mr Kambwili we are going to reconcile on issues not insults,” said Chanda.