UNITED Party for National Development (UPND) has called on Local Government and Rural Development Minister Gary Nkombo to dissolve the Shiwang’andu Constituency Development Fund (CDF) committee.
UPND deputy media director Cheelo Katambo said the failure by the Town Council to implement into use the allocated K25.7 million CDF is sabotage.
“From the onset,we wish to call on the Minister of Local Government and Rural Development Hon Gary Nkombo MP to immediately use powers vested in him through the CDF Act to dissolve the Shiwang’andu Constituency Development Fund Committee for the willful failure to utilise its K25.7 million 2022 allocation,” he said.
Mr Katambo also called on the Local Government Service Commission to immediately recall its senior management officials at Shiwang’andu Town Council for failing to provide technical leadership in the utilisation of the allocated funds.
He said the UPND finds the willful failure to utilise the funds resulting into the none implementation of CDF projects in the district as noted by Senior Chief Nkula as an act of sabotage which is punishable by law.
“Listening to the Senior Chief bemoaning the lack of CDF utilisation in the constituency, has sent shivers down our spines as Government is doing all it can to ensure that community development takes precedence in its development agenda,” he said.
Mr Katambo questioned why children should sit on the floor due to lack of desks and sit in roofless classrooms when CDF is available.
“Mr Stephen Kampyongo and his CDF committee should be ashamed of themselves that they have failed to take advantage of the government’s good indiscriminate intentions aimed at providing development resources to every part of the country,” he said.
He noted that sabotaging Government programs is a crime and punishable by law and called on law enforcement agencies to move in and establish exact circumstances under which pupils in Shiwang’andu are still sitting on the floor and community projects have remained unattended to.
Mr Katambo further called on District Commissioners and party structures to get vigilant in their monitoring of CDF activities across the country and not allow enemies of community development to sabotage well intended policies.
“This scheme aimed at agitating citizens into rising against the government shall not work and the party across the country is asked to rise and make sure this behavior is stamped out,” he said.
He urged opposition parliamentarians to take centre stage in the implementation of Government policies for the good of the people and avoid being in the forefront of sabotage.
(Mwebantu, Saturday, 3rd June, 2023)