Kabushi PF member of parliament Bowman Lusambo says the massive UPND and NDC rallies on the Copperbelt Province last weekend were cosmetic because people were bussed from other parts of the country.

And Lusambo says President Lungu will emerge victorious in 2021 despite load shedding and high mealie meal prices.

In an interview, Lusambo bragged that President Lungu was capable of attracting a bigger crowd in Kabushi alone.

“I have been in this game for some time now and I know the political moods of the people, especially where change is concerned. Even the meetings, which happened in in the Copperbelt Province, it was normal for all of us to have meetings on the Copperbelt and attracting the number of people who were attracted. But those who went to the two meetings came from different towns Hakainde Hichilema picked people from all the towns of the Copperbelt, some came from Solwezi, some were coming from Lusaka, Central Province and many other provinces. Kambwili is the same! So, that is not a litmus test for a political party in the Copperbelt Province. I can assure you that Edgar Chawa Lungu is very popular on the Copperbelt. That is why when you see people going there, they have two to one meetings they come out that ‘we are penetrating Copperbelt’, because they know that there is a bull dozer in this province and that bull dozer is President Edgar Lungu. And If President Lungu decides to go to the Copperbelt today and decide to have a meeting in Kitwe those tuma [small] meetings which were there can be swallowed 20 times,” Lusambo said.

“How can I start competing with so called presidents of political parties with small ‘p’ ; because when you compare my crowd and Kambwili’s and Hakainde’s without tempering with pictures the way they have tempered with Hakainde and Kambwili’s pictures… so they things that they are talking about it’s neither here nor there. If today we decided to hold a meeting with President Edgar Chagwa Lungu in Kabushi, just in Kabushi constituency, the numbers that you saw can be swallowed, just in Kabushi constituency. So for those people who are trying to measure the popularity of the two opposition political parties based on those two meetings are wasting their time. Us we are in governance we are not proposing, we are governing. We are talking about real issues. We are delivering to the expectation of the people.”

He said those who were making a big deal of the opposition rallies were “under five politicians”.

“But the opposition are proposing love to a lady. So they don’t know exactly if that lady will accept their manifesto or not. So they are just touching here or there lying to that lady. So for us we are in marriage. The people talking about the rallies in Kitwe are just under five politicians who can’t see beyond those two rallies. Talk about Bowman Lusambo’s rally in Kabushi which attracted thousands of people without any support of any constituency within the district. We managed to pull crowds that can tell you a very good story. What about Edgar Lungu coming to the Copperbelt? What about Edgar Lungu going into Southern Province? He will attract masses! So they are not saying the truth because the President is doing so much,” Lusambo said.

And Lusambo said despite the economic challenges the country was facing, President Lungu was the most popular Head of State.

“I can assure you that today Edgar Chagwa Lungu is the most popular President in Zambia. Whether we go for elections today Edgar Lungu would win. One would argue that how can President Lungu win if the mealie meal is at K110? How can President Lungu win if there is load shedding? That is not the test of the Presidency. Things change and if people are banking on mealie meal and electricity that we have load shedding and the price of mealie meal is K110 then Edgar Lungu will fail! No he can’t because even him he is working towards harmonizing those things,” said Lusambo.

“Don’t waste your time to concentrate on the online discussions. So if you can call elections today, President Lungu, whether you like it or not, he will win because the people will vote for him and not those people on the blogs. The people who will vote for Edgar Chagwa Lungu are real people the people who analyze the situation, the people who call a spade, a spade not those who are 100 per cent condemning the leadership of the President on the blogs. We cannot govern the county using the blogs and we will not. The people are not on the blogs the people are outside there. We do not concentrate on those bloggers because there are fake people. It is just mere rhetoric I can assure that most of the people who are talking to day are the 1990s. They are computer people they don’t understand other issues apart from being on the blog. So they should differentiate between real life and fantasy.”