So the good pastor Nevers Mumba has found his voice again after what had seemed an eternity in the proverbial wilderness. So much was said about the rebuilding of the Movement for Multi Party Democracy after he took over soon after the party lost the 2011 general elections.
Mumba had that moment in the limelight when he was all over town stoking fires everywhere proclaiming a rebirth of the MMD using a corruption of the PF’s “Donchi Kubeba” anthem which he coined into “Donchi kutina” (Don’t Fear).
For a moment some people took him seriously so much that even the police dignified him with an arrest on one of his public appearances on the Copperbelt in Ndola rural. Did he not bask in that undeserved moment of glory until the grandstanding could only carry him thus far?
It was time to get down to the business with the basic yardstick of growing the party the most obvious. While numerically the MMD still remains the second largest political party in parliament, few could vouch that they will be a factor in the next elections. Lest we forget just after losing the 2011 elections they were still big in numbers despite that political lesson handed to them by the Zambian voters, they still remained the most regionally balanced party with perhaps a healthy return of very brilliant minds that one could have bet on to re-organize the blue side of Zambian politics. But the mouthy pastor being all talk and nothing else set them downhill.
So ruinous has been Mumba’s political strategy that even the most composed and level headed personalities in the party had enough and rendered their support to other political parties notably the ruling PF and the UPND who are still numerically behind in terms of numbers in parliament.
One may have banked on the likes of Felix Mutati, Dr Brian Chituwo, Dr Situmbeko Musokotwane, Kabinga Pande, Professor Geoffrey Lungwangwa and Catherine Namugala among others to lead the way Mumba opted to carry the cross his way.
To cap it all, Mumba, after chewing millions of dollars from international fraudster Rajan Mahtani, bulldozed his way into a presidential election he had no muscle to fight in and miserably amassed 14, 609 votes marking a dramatic fall of the once strong party that had a good command of the national vote. In 2011 the MMD got 902, 611 with then candidate Rupiah Banda.
With that Mumba went shopping for a job from an unresponsive President Edgar Lungu who has snubbed him.
Mumba has been on the hunt for an ambassador position in exchange for auctioning the former ruling party but his scheme has flopped. In any case what support can he render to anyone in his weakened state?
Now he has found his voice and is all over town singing change maybe someone should show him the way to the pulpit! The MMD now has a 25% representation in parliament with the PF at 52.6% while the UPND has 19% with Mumba’s party having lost all the by-elections conducted this year.
The post Opinion: Nevers Mumba’s Weakened Voice appeared first on Zambia Reports.