Judge The PF On Their Actions, Not Their Words
On Wednesday the Patriotic Front (PF) unveiled its long-awaited election manifesto, laying out the government’s policies and priorities for a potential further five years in power.
The overall theme of the document was ‘Making Every Zambian Count’ – a curiously ironic title given the disastrous voter registration exercise of last year and the accusations from civil society that the new voters roll is heavily biased in favour of the PF.
Yet democracy is apparently very important to the PF, with the topic of ‘Good Governance’ topping the new manifesto’s table of contents. The government also lists ‘zero tolerance for corruption, tribalism and violence’ as among its core values.
This pledge to uphold democratic norms is entirely at odds with the PF’s behaviour over the last ten years, which has been overwhelmingly characterised by patterns of violence and corruption.
During the past decade in office the PF has continually turned a blind eye to the violent behaviour of its party cadres, who in turn have grown increasingly bold in their attacks.
In the Summer of 2020, the news was dominated by stories of attacks by PF cadres on local radio stations broadcasting interviews with opposition leader Hakainde Hichilema. In one instance a mob of more than 30 PF heavies stormed Iso FM in Isoka, assaulted security officials and sprayed station staff with gas cannisters.
Nor has this violence been directed solely at members of the political elite. Only last week a civil servant at the Ministry of Works and Supply was harassed by a mob of PF cadres on the mere suspicion that she might support the UPND. Meanwhile a woman in Woodlands, Lusaka made headlines in February after being assaulted by government supporters for the third time in less than a year for selling opposition merchandise at her roadside stall.
Staff at Iso FM hiding from an attack by PF cadres armed with smoke bombs
The government has consistently ignored this kind of violence by its own party members, managing only a half-hearted slap on the wrist for even the most ruthless acts of criminal behaviour.
Then there is the rampant corruption that for ten years has managed to infect every facet of Zambian democracy. In the past few years the government has wasted K378 million on expired medical kits, K4.7 million on salaries for ministers who stayed in office illegally, and K934 million on a fleet of just 42 fire trucks. Meanwhile President Lungu managed to inexplicably grow his personal wealth by almost K13 million in the space of just one year.
On the potentially even more vital issue of the economy, the PF manifesto again points to a track record that simply isn’t supported by the evidence.
President Lungu would like voters to believe his party has overseen “10 Years of Continuous Progress” but when it comes to Zambia’s economy this simply isn’t true. Public debt has more than doubled since the PF took control in 2011l, topping out at over $12 billion at the beginning of this year. In 2020, Zambia became the first African country to default on its debts during the pandemic era.
In the manifesto, President Lungu rightly points out that his government inherited a challenging economic situation, recently exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic. However, even before the pandemic hit Zambia, public spending was out of control and unemployment had been continually growing since 2011.
Now runaway inflation means that many Zambians are struggling to put food on their tables. But the government’s solution is to contract even more debt in order to finance doomed infrastructure projects.
Unemployment in Zambia has consistently increased since the PF took office.
President Lungu also claims he wants to see more Zambian-owned businesses in the country, yet it is his government that has built up such a close relationship with President Xi Jinping of China. This unequal partnership has not only saddled Zambia with huge debts to the Chinese state; it has also led to Zambian workers being repeatedly harassed by abusive Chinese business-owners [link].
The government’s manifesto reads like a beautiful work of fiction: inspiring, but with little bearing on reality. The promises made by the Patriotic Front are not at all supported by their track record on either the economy or democracy and only beg the question of why none of this was achieved during their last ten years in power. If voters are going to be won over to voting for the government once again, they will need to see the PF not just talk the talk but actually walk the walk.