By DAVID KANDUZA –

SHORTLY after President Edgar Lungu held a mammoth rally on the Copperbelt, the ruling Patriotic Front (PF) is causing havoc the in political hotbed of the country with what can be described as Lungumania.
The run-up to the August 2016 general election has been marked with unprecedented levels of defections, the most hit being the main opposition United Party for National Development (UPND) whose 128 members on the Coppebelt defected to the ruling Patriotic Front (PF) in Ndola yesterday.
At a mammoth rally addressed by PF parliamentary aspiring candidate for Kabushi Constituency Bowman Lusambo, a record 128 members from UPND resigned from the party citing an unclear road map for Zambia’s development by its leadership.
The members cited unprecedented development that had taken place on the Copperbelt and saw no reason why they should continue to belong to the UPND.
Speaking shortly after their defection, UPND provincial women secretary a Ms Mukupo who led the group said they decided to defect to the ruling PF because UPND was a dead party on the Copperbelt.
They said no matter how good a person was, it was impossible to score in a losing team.
They said they decided to join the PF because the ruling party had shown commitment in as far as the development of the country was concerned.
And welcoming the defectors, Mr Lusambo said the continued defections by members of the opposition were not being engineered by the PF Government but were as a result of poor leadership by the opposition leaders and good leadership of the party in Government.
He said people should not be deceived by malicious people he named from opposition political parties whose main aim was to frustrate the efforts of the PF Government by spreading lies to Zambians.
Recently, President Edgar Lungu predicted that Zambians should brace themselves for more defections after the dissolution of Parliament last month adding that the defections were normal because Zambians were political nomads in nature.