By Durell Namasani
The constituency, Karonga Central, is slowly living up to its nickname ‘Benghazi’ as politics continues to hot up ahead of the by elections scheduled to take place in the area. This Saturday, Commander in Chief of Citizen for Transformation Movement (CFT) Timothy Mtambo was in the area alongside MCP Central region Campaign director Madalitso Kazombo to drum up support for MCP candidate Leonard Mwalwanda. It has been established however, that the presence of Mtambo on the campaign trail and the endorsement MCP candidate has got from the CFT movement has made some people very uncomfortable, with a group calling itself CFT Karonga coming out to endorse the rival candidate, Frank Mwenefumbo of UTM.
According to a team of our journalists on the ground, it has been established that the CFT Karonga team that is said to have endorsed Mwenefumbo doesn’t even exist. It has been uncovered that the claims have been propaganda work by the UTM team in order to create confusion among the electorates in the area. “There has been nothing like an endorsement for Mwenefumbo from CFT here” said one of CFT members in the area. “What we know is that some people printed CFT Tshirts and distributed them to a certain group, took the pictures and then went on social media and other media houses to claim that they have endorsed Mwenefumbo”.
Writing on his Facebook page, Communication strategist for CFT Negracious Justin, highlighted that the official position of CFT was the endorsement of the MCP candidate, reasons which were announced last week in a statement that came from the movement. “Awo akuti ndi a CFT wo sitikuwadziwa. Printing T-shirts is not a hustle koma akudzinamiza. Unprofitable propaganda of the old century “wrote Justin, making a point that the Movement doesn’t recognize those claiming to be CFT and is aware that it’s just propaganda tricks.
Timothy Mtambo held his first whistle stops in Karonga in which he urged the people in the area to vote for Mwalwanda.
