By JAJAH COULIBALY and Kasonde Kasonde –
FORMER United Party for National Development (UPND) Bweengwa member of Parliament Highvie Hamududu and other UPND officials have ditched the party to form the Party of National Unity (PNU) to foster unity in the country.
Mr Hamududu has advised opposition political parties not accepting defeat to emulate Kenya’s main opposition leader Raila Odinga who wished Kenyan president Uhuru Kenyatta well after losing the previous elections.

Addressing supporters at the party secretariat in Lusaka’s Kabulonga area, Mr Hamududu who is the party’s president said PNU was a movement aimed at promoting the spirit of national unity.
“It is not a crime to form a political party and I have resigned from the UPND and I and others have come up with PNU to offer guidance on national matters,” he said.
He explained that no country in the world would develop without national unity and called for issue based politics unlike personal politics that are currently in the political dispensation.
“If you look at Kenya’s main opposition leader Raila Odinga, he challenged president Uhuru in court after the elections but for peace, love and unity, he went to see Mr Kenyatta at state house and wished
him well and now he’s a hot cake in Kenya,” he said.
He added that the PNU was going to bring sanity in politics with hope of forming government in the 2021 general elections.
PNU interim vice president Anthony Lusaka emphasized that no tribe or district can make progress by ignoring the interest of national unity.
Mr Lusaka who also announced his resignation from the UPND with immediate effect said he had a noble task to bring about national unity, integration and national building.
“Zambians must not be used by leaders to commit violence because those that do that are sponsored and that’s what we don’t want to see,” he said.