Africa-Press – Zambia. CHIEF Government Spokesperson Cornelius Mweetwa has wondered why the PF are priding themselves on the money they borrowed when they failed to repay it.
Mweetwa adds that the UPND has not borrowed more than what the PF borrowed in 10 years.
On Friday, PF faction Acting President Given Lubinda said, as opposed to the UPND government, his party could point to where the money they borrowed went.
In an interview on Sunday, Mweetwa said the PF had leaders who did not understand how the economy worked, thereby leaving the country in an economic doldrum.
“First of all, you have to understand that PF as a party, many of its leaders, failed to understand how the economy works, and that’s how they left the country in economic doldrums. When you look at the budget for this year, it tells you what the government intends to do with their borrowing. Out of the K253.1 billion, K20 billion is meant for repayment of external credit. The money that these people who now have energy to talk [about what they] borrowed that amount of money could have been way above if President HH and his team had not managed to attain debt restructuring. This shows that the debt was insurmountable, which is why government in 2020, the PF government defaulted,” he said.
“So, if today they want to pride themselves on borrowing and that they have something to show for it, how can you pride yourself on borrowing chickens from your neighbour, eating chicken, and yet failing to pay that neighbour? To an extent that the neighbour says, ‘I am not going to lend you kapenta because you have defaulted on your chicken and are not paying anything. So, it is better for your children to starve.’ That is the situation of where they left the economy. So, if I were him, I would have shut up.”
Mweetwa said the UPND had not borrowed more than what the PF borrowed in 10 years, adding that the money the previous regime got ended up in the hands of a few individuals.
“It’s not true that we have borrowed more than them in 10 years. They should give statistics; they should not just talk. Let them give statistics of borrowing. Because with borrowing, there are two levels: one, you borrow because you are meeting the obligation that the country has a growing concern you are obliged to meet. Seventy billion of this budget is going towards debt repayment. And out of that debt repayment, it is repayment of debt that was incurred by themselves. Do they expect us not to cushion by way of borrowing in order to meet our obligation now as a government, of which the debt was left by themselves? When you are going to borrow in order to meet budgetary estimations, what is prudent is to show where that money has gone,” he said.
“And when you look at borrowing and what has been out, I think 2.3% of the GDP is within the right levels because we are running an economy of integrity. We are going to take them on when they talk about borrowing because they are the ones who are talking about electricity, forgetting [that] Zesco lost credibility to borrow from certain suppliers of electricity because of the huge debt they left. Do they expect this government to fold hands and say, ‘This huge debt Zesco owes, because if we borrow to pay, we are expanding the debt portfolio’? You will recall that we are coming from a bad situation of drought, and we needed to feed our people. Wherever money has been borrowed under this administration, it ended up with the beneficiaries; it did not end up in the hands of few [people] building flats, lodges, and mansions, and selling second-[hand] motor vehicles as a way of money laundering.”
Meanwhile, Mweetwa said the 2026 National Budget, which was aimed at maintaining the UPND’s socio-economic gains, had been well received across the country.
“This budget [2026] across the country has not received any criticism except from those with certain areas of interest. Otherwise, this budget has been well received, and it has exceeded the anticipation of some people who were looking at this budget in terms of the elections. This will be a budget that will provide political sweeteners in order to win elections in 2026. Nothing like that has happened. The focus has been maintained to ensure that the socio-economic gains that have been attained thus far are consolidated as we move towards 2026. So, people like those will always talk, but it is important sometimes to just say, ‘Look at our colleagues doing fine.’ And even now, the debt they are talking about has been included in the budget, and we are paying what they failed to pay themselves. They should have been saying thank you,” said Mweetwa.
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