CHAIRPERSON of the meet the President fundraising Gala committee Raphael Muyanda says the money that will be raised from the event will be used to empower youths and women.
During a media briefing, Thursday, Muyanda said the event was expected to take place on Saturday.
He added that UPND was on a path to honour its promises because there was a crisis of expectations among youths and women.
“When we raise these funds, they will be targeted at firstly the youth. The youth are in a crisis of expectation, and the women. So the funds we will generate will be utilized or given to the youth and the women so that they are empowered to run or meet the obligations or the promises we made. The empowerment policy is very clear by the party. We are not talking about giving them money, wake up in the morning without guidelines. The guidelines will be released and prepared by the party for the youth and women because there is a crisis of expectations among the youth and women. We are on a path to remember them and to implement and honour our promises,” Muyanda said.
He said external auditors would audit the funds that would be raised during the gala.
“The purpose of fundraising is something that you might be aware that during the campaigns, that it was one of our campaign promises which the Republican President informed the nation, that the party will be separated from government. The party will have its own ways of raising resources in order to run our party. This is part of the process which has now started. There will be many more other events which will be taking place in order to raise funds. This further triggers the element of transparency, we would like to assure the nation and the people of the Republic of Zambia that UPND is determined to run a government of transparency. This is another initiative that UPND is transparently raising funds,” Muyanda said.
“Further within the concept of transparency, there should be an element that should be made clear, these funds once we are through with the whole exercise, the funds will be audited by external auditors. This is another assurance which our President has been firm about, utilization of resources and specifically accountability. It centers on accountability, that we are a party that is responsible enough that when we have resources we are accountable. We enjoy transparency in UPND.”
Asked how much money was likely to be raised, Muyanda said he could not specify the amount at the moment.
“The amount that we are anticipating to generate, it cannot at the moment be stated. The rationale for that is simple because we do not know who will turn up, we do not know who is not going to turn up. So, we can not preempt the amounts we wish we may generate. We will wait until every ngwee is collected and we will come back to the members of the public that the gala raised so much. We are very transparent. Those who have bought tickets and those who are in the process, we are expecting them to turn up because they have bought the tickets. To say that the response is overwhelming is indeed a correct statement but the point is do we know who will turn up? There are times that people will buy tickets and people will not turn up. This is an ongoing fundraising process, there will be other projects that will be followed,” said Muyanda.
