By 
President Hakainde Hichilema has warned against politics of division and urged citizens to preserve national unity by supporting the ruling United Party for National Development (UPND) in the August 13, general election.
Hichilema also took a swipe at opposition leaders, Brian Mundubile and Makebi Zulu, accusing them of mismanaging public resources during the previous administration when the duo served as Northern and Eastern Province Ministers.
Launching his campaign trail for the August 13 general election, Hichilema accused the opposition of seeking power for selfish reasons and warned that they would reverse the gains his administration had made.
President Hichilema held a mega rally at Heroes Stadium in Lusaka on Sunday where he outlined his vision for the next five years should Zambians renew his mandate.
“Those two were provincial ministers. One in Eastern Province and the other in Northern Province and plundered government money, including the reserves at the Bank of Zambia. My message to those two boys is simple: go back to school,” he said.
President Hichilema thanked the people of Lusaka for turning up in large numbers stating that they had removed “shame” on him as the crowds were real and not artificially generated.
“We know the high cost of living is high. We are listening and working to make it affordable,” the Head of State said while chanting ‘salt sana.’
He paid glowing tribute to Zambians for according him, a villager from Bweengwa in Southern Province the courtesy of becoming the Head of State to superintend over the country’s affairs.
He also thanked Zambians for their patience in the last five years through which he said he worked hard to turn round the economic fortunes of the country under difficult circumstances.
He said although his administration had made significant progress, more work remained to be done.
“We have worked hard but there is still more to be done. Life is still challenging for a lot of people. We hear you when you complain in your homes. We feel the challenges that you feel and we will not rest until we fulfil our promises,” President Hichilema said.
He added that his administration had laid a solid foundation for the country’s development through programmes such as free education and large-scale recruitment of teachers.
“Free education is now law and beyond that we have employed 40, 000 teachers, something no government has ever achieved,” Hichilema said.
The President also said Zambia was on course to reap major benefits from increased mining investment and production.
“We shall soon begin earning more than US$40 billion from the mines,” he said.
Hichilema cited the successful restructuring of the country’s debt and the rebuilding of foreign reserves as evidence that its economy was recovering.
However, Green Party President Peter Sinkamba has dismissed claims by the United Party for National Development (UPND) that it had resolved Zambia’s debt crisis, saying official data showed total debt had increased since 2021.
Sinkamba argued that debt restructuring was not debt forgiveness and did not mean the debt had been erased, saying Zambia’s total debt stock had significantly increased between 2021 and 2026 under the UPND administration.
The Tonse Alliance Presidential Campaign Committee Chairperson for Copperbelt Province, issued the statement titled “dispelling the myth-the UPND has not fixed Zambia’s debt, accumulation continues to rise, and e even worse,” in Kitwe on Monday.
Citing fiscal data, Sinkamba said UPND inherited external public debt of US$13.04 billion, about K210 billion, with an additional US$1.5 billion in sovereign guarantees primarily for ZESCO.
“The claims by the United Party for National Development (UPND) administration that they have ‘fixed’ Zambia’s debt crisis are fundamentally false and misleading to the Zambian public,” he said.
Sinkamba claimed that by 2026, total external public debt had climbed to over US$14.8 billion, while broader external liabilities including non-guaranteed public sector energy and fuel arrears have pushed total external vulnerability to over US$23.3 billion, approximately K440 billion.
“To correct the narrative, the public must look at the actual trajectory of both the direct government debt and state-guaranteed liabilities, which have ballooned in both United States Dollars (USD) and Zambian Kwacha (ZMW),” he said.
On domestic debt, Sinkamba said UPND inherited K193 billion, about US$11.9 billion, with domestic guarantees and fuel/agricultural arrears at roughly K42 billion in 2021.
As at 2026, Sinkamba claimed that domestic government securities had reached over K252.8 billion, about US$13.3 billion, driven by borrowing to finance budget deficits and the 2026 Annual Borrowing Plan adds an extra K21.6 billion in net domestic financing.
He contended that the debt restructuring framework was a Patriotic Front initiative, not UPND’s and that the PF hired Lazard Frères in May 2020 as financial advisors and applied for G20 Common Framework debt treatment in February 2021.
“When the UPND took office in August 2021, they did not build a new car; they simply sat in the driver’s seat of an already moving vehicle,” Sinkamba said.
He said the UPND inherited an established legal framework, active international advisors, and an open application with the G20 Official Creditor Committee.
Sinkamba blamed delays in concluding restructuring on geopolitics and the UPND’s handling of diplomacy, citing a tug-of-war between Western multilateral lenders and bilateral lenders, specifically China.
“By over-aligning with Western institutions early on, the UPND alienated Eastern creditors, turning a technical financial negotiation into a prolonged geopolitical battlefield that delayed final signatures until 2024 and 2025,” he said.
Sinkamba said the UPND failed to manage the G20 rule of Comparability of Treatment and noted that in late 2023 official bilateral creditors led by China and France rejected a deal with Eurobond holders because private Western banks were offered better terms than sovereign nations.
He stated that the UPND had merely renegotiated terms of a debt that was larger today than in 2021, using a framework designed by the PF, after delays he said paralyzed local business credit for years.
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