Africa-Press – Zambia. The Presidency of Hakainde Hichilema a.k.a. Bally is reminiscent of the contest between the Prophet Elijah and the worshippers of Baal. In today’s Zambia, you either worship Bally or like Elijah in untold insults and curses dwell. Who are you among countless prophets of Bally, who like King Ahab to question is to curse the very god of the land except Mount Carmel exists only in Plot 1. So bring it on, O countless followers and prophets of Bally, but a single voice to silence not! Like Elijah, my lonely voice speaks for masses who love our motherland over the Bally cult that blinds masses from watching countless campaign videos of HH making promises with datelines attached to them just months ago. Is it your distorted faith in Bally that shames you? Are you afraid to face the truth that Bally’s promises, like those of the prophets of Baal, are now chants of shame to drench your hearts each day and night? It is your democratic right to shout, “Answer us, Bally! Just for once! Shame Kapya Kaoma! Give us free education now! Reduce the cost of utubunga.” But like Baal, your Bally will be sleeping or on vacation! Those promises will never ever come to pass!
You may try again next year. “Hear us almighty Bally! The most brilliant economist ever to walk the face of the earth! Give us free education! Reduce the cost of ubunga at kabili! ”
This time around, you will supplicate with incense and dances as you celebrate his one year at the helm of power and much louder. But Bally would have developed amnesia or simply forgotten your cries! And so you will keep on ranting and raving year after year until 2026, but no answer will come! The bag of mealie meal won’t cost K50. Neither would Zambia provide free education from grade 1 to University unless you are HH’s or UPND cadres’ special child. As for the Kwacha to be K5 to a dollar, it is a dream! As for those graduates, well good for you! Like some of us, we will be looking for jobs unless we’re ready to go back to the land or sell at the markets or the streets. Office jobs aren’t coming back–the very Bally massacred with another self-declared, all-knowing, Western vultures-worshiping capitalist F.T.J. Chiluba.
But worry not! Like the almighty Jezebel, Vice President Mutale Nalumango will continue to shame those Parliamentarians who for years stole from us in poverty we languished. Alas, our despicable poverty, the great Bally promised to fix–with white gloves as if Ahab he announced:
“Listen all you Zambians. Am I not the chosen one by the owners of the IMF and the World Bank, the White gods of Capitalism? Just vote for me on August 12, 2021 and the venture capitalists will dump all their dollars on me! I will give them what they want and by September 1, a bag of mealie meal will be K50. Education will be free. A dollar will be K5. “Mulekutika?” As for farmers, I will buy your maize at K250 per bag. Unemployment will be history, and low cost of living for every Zambian. Believe me, I won’t bring back any corrupt minister who worked in the MMD or PF administrations–only clean Masebo, Mutati and… ”
At this, all his worshipers–the learned and the unlearned, responded, “Amen! Bally will fix it.” Sadly they are struck by the highly contagious and deadly ballyvirus–the virus that erases the mind. Vice President Nalumango vividly revealed it in Parliament. She could not swallow the many promises HH made to Zambians–she choked. She could “not remember” them. Instead she accused the corrupt PF cartel in Parliament of hallucinating.
“Bally the Great, the Savior of Zambia could not be so foolish to make such illogical promises.”
With those words, she shamed dishonorable Chitotela! I think Chitotela deserved it. He should have been rotting in jail for corruption, but he was acquitted!
This is the new dawn indeed. The dawn of dishonesty and deception. But watching our new Vice President develop ballyvirus so early was embarrassingly pitiable, but who cares? She has nothing to lose – – her memory is completely erased. As for Bally worshipers, they too are victims of the deadly bellyvirus. Trust me, the memory of a baby is much more alert to breast milk than to a UPND cadre who can’t recall that President Hichilema made any promises. It is what it is. To a UPND cadre, words don’t mean anything! Please don’t abuse the Vice President or any victim of ballyvirus. The bitter PF MPs are foolish enough to expect them to remember candidate HH campaign promises, for once he put on his white gloves, our beloved president erased their memories. Not even videos would convince them–so leave them in the romantic nostalgia of the Bally honeymoon.
I don’t know if Bally worshippers really love President HH. But if they do, then they must not take offense to questioning President HH. Democratic leadership begins on the first day in office.
To allow President HH to govern as if people don’t exist (no matter how popular the president is) is not democratic governance, but dictatorship. Moreover unaccountability is like a tree–it grows with time. Imagine the amount of time and energy it would serve to uproot it when it is small than when it has grown. In early days of their administration, Presidents are testing the waters of what they can get away with; another reason to watch them carefully.
So if Bally has legitimate followers, they should demand accountability from the onset. As Bembas say, “Akafumbe ukunona, kafuma kubwaice.” Once HH has gotten used to roam unaccountable, he becomes a uncaged lion. I rather stop him now than later!
I understand many Zambians don’t understand U.S politics. HH paid a courtesy visit to Vice President Harris, but what his cadres don’t understand is that the Biden administration was held accountable from Day 1 by its own party. It continues to deliver based on the Democratic Party Platform or what in Zambia we call Manifesto. When it fails, Democrats ensure that the administration reverses its course to meet the party’s platform. Biden’s appointments were based on merit not on wako ni wako, as was the case with President HH’s, whose Salaula Cabinet is just as dirty as previous ones. His creation and consolidation of Ministries without consultation with Parliament is just as dictatorial and ideological as creating the ministry of Religious Affairs under previous administrations.
In a democratic society, the creation or consolidation of Ministries must be debated, with the costs analysis and personnel implementation factored in before being formed. Ruling by declaration is a recipe for dictatorship!
In short, the only thing that has changed is the name of the President, the tradition remains the same. I rather be alone, than join a cult of the big man!
