NDC national youth chairperson Charles Kabwita says Zambians should pray for President Edgar Lungu to develop a listening ear on October 18.

And Kabwita says if government listened to critics, it would have terminated all power export agreements until the electricity crisis came to an end.

In an interview ahead of the National Day of Prayer and Fasting, Kabwita said people should also pray and ask God to reveal the real corrupt elements cited in the FIC report as well as the owners of the 48 miraculous house in Chalala.

“Our request, therefore, is to see that these who are organizing these prayers as they pray for the government leaders, they should also pray for these things that I have itemized. They should also pray for President Lungu so that when we criticize him, he can have a listening ear. He can act on certain requests that we make in the opposition. As the opposition, we are not just here to criticize but we also offer solutions to this government. But each time when we strike a point, we are perceived to be enemies. So when we are giving constructive criticism, it should be treated as such and we must never be perceived to be enemies,” Kabwita said.

He said people should petition God on October 18 so that he reveals the real owners of the 48 houses among other corruption-related issues.

“The organizers [of the National Day of Prayer] obviously have a list of requests that they have laid down to make petitions to God so that the challenges such as corruption, the names or players of those cited in the FIC report. As youths in the NDC, our advancement to these who are organizing the event is that they should put it as a request so that God can be able to reveal to us who these corrupt players are, those who are stealing from the poor people of Zambia. We would also want to know as youths in the NDC who the real owner of the 48 houses in Chalala, Lusaka are? We would also want to know why is it that in Zambia, people who are corrupt yet this government is very busy fighting the opposition at the expense of developing this country. if the present government was serious with the fight against corruption, today we wouldn’t have this situation of high price of mealie meal, high price of fuel, and high price of electricity,” he said.

Kabwita said if government was reasonable enough, it would have terminated the contract of exporting power to neighbouring countries when the country still had a shortage.

“Electricity today is rationed. Other people cannot even see or have electricity in their houses because Zambia has continued to export power to Congo, Malawi, Zimbabwe, Tanzania and other countries when people here do not have electricity. A reasonable government could have stopped this transaction or this contract of exporting power. This contract should have been terminated in order to benefit Zambians. By the way, the money that is being gotten from these countries where power is exported, we cannot even see the meaningful development that it brings about. So what is the whole purpose of having this transaction which does not benefit the ordinary citizens of this country,” Kabwita added.

He said youths were still languishing in poverty because President Lungu had not given them the 5,000 jobs which he promised before being elected.

“We have been subjected to continuing paying high taxes, we have been subjected to living in economic hardships where youths who were lied to by President Edgar Lungu that as and when he is elected, he will create over 5,000 jobs. Youths today are just languishing in the streets of Lusaka, Copperbelt and other provinces. There is no hope even in the budget that the Honourable Minister of Finance [Dr Bwalya Ng’andu] gave to parliament. It was just empty promises. It was just numbers and figures on the paper which does not translate into the good life of the ordinary citizen of Zambia,” he said.

And Kabwita insisted that President Lungu should hold a press conference to discuss Zambia’s problems.

“Can we once and for all, have the president call for a press conference where he will talk about issues that are affecting the people of Zambia. We did not elect President Edgar Lungu to be giving us short speeches at the airport which he normally does when he is flying out. We are not interested in that. We want President Edgar Lungu to call for a press conference where he will interact with the nation. So let him not hide in parliament, let him not hide at the airport where he will give you an excuse that ‘I am about to fly and so I can’t answer you.’ We want the president to give this country even about three hours of interaction. That is why we elected him as our leader. We did not elect him to be eating snakes in Mbala no,” said Kabwita.