By STEVEN ZANDE –
FORUM for Democracy and Development (FDD) president Edith Nawakwi has ruled out any possibility of teaming up with the United Party for National Development (UPND) in this year’s general election.
Speaking when she featured on ‘The Assignment’ programme on Muvi TV on Sunday, Ms Nawakwi said the FDD has no intentions of forming a pact with UPND leader Hakainde Hichilema, because such a partnership had collapsed in the past.
She said rumours had been surfacing that the two parties were formalising talks for an alliance and that such talk was non existent.
“UPND is notorious in a number of areas, certain party officials have been going round announcing the impending alliance with FDD, but we are not going to do that because this party has been in several alliances before and they failed,” Ms Nawakwi said.
She said the FDD could not ‘escort’ another political party to win an election, because her party enjoyed massive support from the Zambians.
Meanwhile, Ms Nawakwi has urged agricultural students to consider venturing into agro-business upon completing their studies.
She said in the face of harsh economic realities, students should not depend only on formal employment, but venture into private businesses such as agriculture, which offered good retains if well tended.
She said there was need to re-focus attention from maize to crops such as sunflower and groundnuts.
“We need to be smart and discover which other crops we can invest in. Is it millet, sunflower or groundnuts? These are some of the crops that we should give enough attention so that agriculture grows alongside maize,” she said.