OPERATION YOUNG VOTE (OYV)
Lotti
House, 6th Floor, Suite 21, Cairo Road P.O. Box 30153
LUSAKA
8th May, 2015
MEDIA STATEMENT FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
It makes very sad and vexing reading the kind of politics the
people of Petauke particularly and Zambians generally are being subjected to by
the Patriotic Front (PF) political party and Government.
OYV is of the resolve that there is no
justification whatsoever for the PF to impose Dora Siliya on the people of
Petauke, after she was rejected in the primary election for the adoption
process, but also the petitioning of her 2011 election victory by the PF
through its candidate that lost.
First and foremost it is
irresponsible, heartless and evil for the PF to have petitioned Dora’s election
victory in 2011 and subjected people of Petauke to go for more than two (2)
years without a representative in Parliament, and wanting to see a “powerful”
candidate in her today. The PF went further and fought tooth and nail, Dora’s
bid to re-contest her seat on the opposition Movement for Multiparty Democracy
(MMD). It is beyond being hypocritical for the PF today to decide to impose
Dora on the people of Petauke just to waste another close to K7 million kwacha
for an election.
Our conclusion is that the PF will go
to any lengths to disrespect the people’s decision even if it means them
wasting money that could be channeled to needy areas like delivering a people
driven constitution, placing medicines in health centres, operationalizing the
student loan scheme among others. If they wanted Dora to be the representative
of the people of Petauke they should not have petitioned her 2011 election
victory.
OYV is of the considered view that if
Dora is really genuine on her joining the PF she should be ready to be an
ordinary member and campaign for Mr. Daka or Mr. Banda who beat her in the
primary election for adoption. If the two preferred candidates got 11 and 10
votes while Dora trailed with only 4 votes, why should she be imposed on the
local PF and the people of Petauke? If Dora is not asked to throw her weight
behind either Mr. Daka or Mr. Banda, then the kind of political prostitution
that our politicians are used to will be difficult to stop. This also entails
continued frustration of genuine, committed, hardworking and dedicated members
of the PF a situation that may lead to them voting for the candidates from
other political parties compromising the chances of PF winning the election and
generally loosing popularity.
With the foregoing, we at OYV are
therefore appealing to the morality and conscience of the PF leadership (the
President who is also Republican President, the Secretary General, the entire
Central Committee) to rejected being put to test and taken for granted, by
allowing Dora to be an ordinary PF member so that she supports the PF locally
preferred candidate. PF must set a precedence of stopping political
prostitution and also bring to an end the “Alpha and Omega” syndrome in
politics by those that think they are indispensable even when they use crooks
methods to remain in political office.
We believe time to stop this rot is
now.
Guess Nyirenda (Mr.)
Executive Director
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