. Mwaba

By ANDREW PHIRI –
ZAMBIA Congress of Trade Union (ZCTU) secretary general Roy Mwaba has urged presidential aspirants to focus their campaigns on national development.
The Congress also warned that the labour movement will only support candidates they will sign a memorandum of understanding with so that they are held accountable for their actions when they get into power.
Mr Mwaba said the labour movement was evaluating all presidential aspirants with a view to gauge and advise their members on who to vote for.
He was speaking in Livingstone during a Press briefing on Wednesday.
Mr Mwaba said the Patriotic Front (PF) Government still has a chance to get re-elected and address some of the challenges the country were faced with.
The PF made promises and still had a chance to look into issues of poverty reduction, job creation and making available the much needed Constitution, among other issues.
“We don’t want rhetoric or verbal promises. We want a candidate who will come up with a roadmap for the Constitution and we want a candidate who will address the issue of retirement age, reinstate the fired nurses and lift the wage freeze because it’s illegal,” Mr Mwaba said.
Mr Mwaba called on the PF and the MMD to end their internal leadership wrangles and focus on giving Zambians presidential candidates that would address the many challenges people were faced with.
Meanwhile, all is set for 14th ZCTU quadrennial congress that has attracted about 400 delegates and will be opened by the Minister of Labour and Social Security Fackson Shamenda.
He announced that there would be elections and that all positions were going to be contested.
Mr Mwaba said the current ZCTU president Leonard Hikaumba and himself would not contest their seats this time and said a new president and SG would be ushered into office.