UPND childish, immature, says Eric Chanda
WE find it very childish and immature for the UPND to start insulting Saboi Imboela after she dished them and joined us because she is free to do so, National Development Congress (NDC) spokesperson Eric Chanda has said.
Ms. Imboela early this week defected to the NDC from the UPND claiming that the UPND was a tribal party but the UPND attacked her, calling her demeaning names.
However, Mr. Chanda yesterday said it was wrong for the UPND to demonise Ms. Imboela simply because she had exercised her constitutional right of association because the same people failed to find any fault in her when she was still with them.
He said it was wrong for UPND to take a “holistic approach” over her decision to associate herself with the NDC and that the UPND should only come to terms with the fact that it had lost one of its members to a political party that was destined to liberate Zambians.
“It is very unfortunate that the UPND has opted to insult and threaten Ms. Imboela after she decided to ditch the UPND and join the NDC. As NDC, we find it very childish and immature for the UPND to take a holistic approach towards Ms. Imboela and we wish to remind them that Ms. Imboela is a very free citizen and has a right to belong to any political party of her choice,” Mr. Chanda said.
He said there was need for the UPND to play clean and mature politics as opposed to throwing insults on their opponents.
“She was an angel when she was a UPND member but why should she now be called all sorts of names all because she has decided to join NDC? Our focus is to liberate the Zambian people and provide solutions to the many challenges that our people are facing.
“You tell the UPND to accept that they have lost one member of their own and they should not behave in a childish way by insulting people. We need maturity on the political scene,” he said.
This comes five days after Ms. Saboi and UPND sympahiser Larry Mweetwa treated readers to a bitter exchange of words following Ms. Imboela’s defection to the NDC.
Ms. Imboela reacted angrily to Mr. Mweetwa, branding the UPND as a tribal party which had become Mr. Mweetwa’s birth right on account of his tribe.
“Until UPND goes for a convention and cleans out a few people that feel that the party is theirs by virtue of their tribe, it will continue to lose people that are genuinely talented and want the best for the party and dare me to publish all names of most party structures even in Lusaka or Kafue and you will see what I mean,” Ms. Imboela said in her response to Mr. Mweetwa’s attacks.