By NATION REPORTER
HARRY Kalaba has raised a red flag against a string of communication gaffs and governance failures by President Hakainde Hichilema, which has in the recent days seen the Head of State tell untruths to Zambians about as many things including ending load shedding, which has embarrassingly resulted into a revolt amongst citizens.
Mr Kalaba is acutely shocked that the people who have publicly confessed of having misinformed President Hichilema from Zesco, the Zambia Revenue Authority, the Minister of Energy Peter Kapala and his permanent Secretary, Francesca Zyambo were all still in office while the President is facing the embarrassment of their actions.
Mr Kalaba said it was clear that Preasident Hichilema had remained misinformed for a long time and that was why the head of State once wrongly claimed that the Kafue Lower Gorge had been abandoned in 2019 and had only been resuscitated by the UPND government.
“It is shocking that given the embarrassment that has befallen the President following his numerous comments, first on how he would end load shedding prior to being elected and second that he had ended it within 8 months of being in office, so many of the people who told him it was over remain in office. The list of people who could have misled the President is endless. The Minister of Energy, the Permanent Secretaries at Ministry of Energy, his advisers at State House and the entire ZESCO Senior Management who are ALL still in their positions.”
“It seems the President has been misled for a long time. He claimed that Kafue Gorge Lower (KGL) had been abandoned in 2019 and his Government resuscitated it and claimed that the financial problems related to other Independent Power Producers had been resolved and yet this was far from the truth. The President even implied that they had now started exporting power which seemingly had never happened before until he got into office. This is either truly a lack of information or the President is a man who likes to reap where he did not sow,” Mr Kalaba said.
Mr Kalba said Zesco was in a worse financial situation than it was last year and that its staff numbers had exponentially increased than before Mr Hichilema ascended to the President.
He stated that Zesco was spending huge amounts of money on human resource and that expenses were having a toll on the treasury of the power utility company.
In its current form, ZESCO has no capacity to solve Zambia’s power problems as bankability for new projects will be impossible in the short to medium term.
“The President has even gone further to constitute a taskforce comprised of the same people who have created this unprecedented level of load shedding. What will that achieve? I think it is basic logic that you cannot solve a problem with the same mindset that created that problem. We have seen serious dither and delay in the last 16 months regarding projects that had been started in the previous regime for reasons that are unclear resulting in missed opportunities and ultimate cost escalation,” Mr Kalaba said.
He said President Hichilema was making voters wonder and doubt about his ability to make big decisions because the head of State had remained in the valley of indecision.
