MMD president Nervous Mumba says it is too early for the party to enter into any alliance with either the UPND or the PF because the former ruling party is focussed on rebuilding.

And Mumba says News Diggers! editors wasted their time and ink when they suggested that he had won a white elephant in their editorial.

Speaking on United Voice Radio’s Add Your Voice programme, Wednesday, Mumba said time to consider alliances would come.

“I think that every political party, not just MMD, we have to think on how they are going to face 2021. At this particular point, it is a bit too early for us to indulge in that question because we have just got the party and therefore, our concentration right now is to rebuild this party. We shall reclaim the lost political space. We have the experience, we have the people and we have the resources. I think that Zambians should be happy that there is not only two political parties to choose from, there are three now, none of these three can claim to be ahead of the other because this is going to be become clear at the beginning of 2021 or in the middle of 2021,” Mumba said.

“Right now, we are all working. When and if time for alliances come, it is not only MMD but all the other parties including PF, UPND, NDC, and Mr Kalaba’s (DP) party. They are all going to start looking for alliances at some point so everybody might come to that point and they will come to that point so I do not think that we are isolated from that need but also want to make it very very clear that right now, we want to make sure that this party recaptures its position so that as and when we go into any alliance, if we have to, we are going to be an equal partner that contributes effectively to that alliance.”

Mumba commended Felix Mutati for conceding defeat.

“I think for my friend Mutati, I want to commend him for the step that he has taken. Like I said, about soccer loss, [it] should not destroy you. Leadership comes out when you lose, when you face a set back because that is when the eyes are on you, how are you going to respond to that? By him standing and saying ‘listen I have lost, I agree with the courts, I was wrong with the people that followed me and therefore I will not appeal because there is no need for me to appeal and therefore I would like for life to give me a next step’, I think that is extremely important. To the young man (Raphael) Nakacinda who has appealed again, that sends a compromised message about his leadership because for him, it is unless he wins then nothing else will be accepted. I think that he is implicating his future and he is losing a great opportunity that he could use to become somebody bigger,” he said.

When asked by Moderator Patrick Nkama what he thought about a Diggers editorial comment suggesting that he had won a white elephant in the mmd, Mumba said the newspaper had wasted its time and ink.

“When they say that to Nevers Mumba, it is a waste of time, waste of ink, waste of paper and waste of opportunity to have said something else. Look, my whole life is a life and ministry of restoration, healing [and] reconstruction. So when they say ‘you have inherited an empty shell’ what point are they trying to make? Are they saying we should not reconstruct it, we should not rebuild it, you should just leave it because you should just inherit good things that are already complete and whole? I do not believe that. My position has always been ‘my eyes are on the ball’. I keep my eyes focused on the development of the country on the well being of my nation and the prosperity of our people, on the defeat of sickness and poverty so that my country can become number one on the continent,” said Mumba.