Africa-Press – Zambia. Nakonde Member of Parliament Lukas Simumba has urged the New Dawn Administration to accept that they have failed in running the affairs of the nation.
Mr Simumba noted that the United Party for National Development – UPND Government promised the Zambian people especially the youths alot yet it has not delivered on any of the promises made, adding that the over 40, 000 civil servants that where employed are just a drop in the ocean and the UPND should therefore address issues of unemployment as promised. He added that the cost of living is unbearable for many Zambians and the New Dawn Administration is overlooking this issue.
“People are suffering, that I can assure you, even within the House the Members of Parliament are suffering, if me as a Member of Parliament I can fail to look after my relatives what about an ordinary citizen, this is worrying and the best the UPND Administration can do is to confirm and confess and also render an apology to the Zambian people by saying that whatever they promised, such as promising to reduce mealie meal prices from whatever amount to 50 Kwacha, how much is mealie meal now? they promised the Zambian people that they will be giving 8 bags of fertilizer, but come to Nakonde and witness what people are sharing in a common meda, this is what is happening and yet the UPND are saying they are delivering,” Mr Simumba expressed this with concern
Commenting on the issue of load shedding, Mr Simumba mentioned that the load shedding was like a song, adding that why can’t the UPND Government cancel the contract if they have found out that the Patriotic Front – PF signed the said contracts, it can be done the same way they have cancelled the contracts for roads.
On July 27th, 2022, President Hakainde Hichilema told the nation that his Government had succeeded to end load-shedding in less than a year of being elected.
Speaking when commissioning the Kalene Hills Factory, President Hichilema said that this was a step towards the many great achievements that the people voted for stating that “Most of you are not aware, when we were campaigning here in Mwinilunga, we said to the people in Mwinilunga, Ikelengi and this province that when we form the Government, within one year we will end load shedding. We have therefore ended load shedding, in less than a year.” A month later, the President repeated this assurance on his social media pages, saying: “When we came in, there was load shedding.”
On 10th August, 2022 President Hichilema said a Facebook post on his official page that When the UPND takes over power next year(2021), they will ensure that they harness all the God given resources from water, wind and sunlight, to ensure they maximize them into electricity generation for the benefit of industry and ordinary citizens in all the communities. Adding that they will do this by inviting credible local and foreign investors to partner with the Zambian citizens, especially the youths in investment in solar, wind and geothermal power generation, and ultimately bring the electricity tariffs to affordable levels for the benefit of all the people.
President Hichilema went on to add that Late last year (2019), the Patriotic Front – PF party announced through its mobilization official, that load shedding would end within six months. Later the story graduated into a new theory of the rate at which water travels from Victoria Falls to the Kariba Dam as being a determining factor on when load shedding would end. However the intensity of outages even increased further, with certain parts of the country being blacked out for more than 14hrs per day for weeks and months on end.
The 2019/2020 rain season has been the heaviest in years and water catchment in most of Zambia’s waterways has been bursting at the seams, so then what is the real problem? Fellow citizens, this is no longer a factor of how much water is needed to generate electricity, but how much more incompetence of the PF will Zambia put up with. Zambia holds more water bodies than any other SADC member, and yet electricity remains a scarce and endangered resource in this country. The question is why?
Opposite to what was promised by President Hichilema UPND led Government to end loadshedding within a year of being in office, on 15th December, 2022 loadshedding was re-introduced by the power utility, Zesco Limited, stating that the daily load-shedding of up to six hours countrywide is because of low water levels at Kariba Dam, the country’s main power plant.
The introduction of six hours load shedding has been condemned by various stakeholders in the political and business spheres as this goes against what the UPND promised the Zambian people on ending load shedding which has resumed.
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