Tourism Minister Sylvia Masebo says Zambia will never be led by a Tonga president because the Southerners are not willing to embrace other tribes.

Speaking at a campaign rally in Livingstone today, Masebo said the Tonga people were being used to perpetrate tribal politics.

But the PF Chairperson for elections said people should vote for Hakainde Hichilema on merit.

"Let us vote for HH because he is good and not because he is Tonga, don't be used in politics of tribalism. We should not agree to tribalism. We should reject this because some of you are married to Bembas; some of you are married to Lozis. We can't have a country based on tribe," she said.

Masebo charged that Hichilema was a president for Southern Province only.

She said the candidate that the UPND had fielded in the Livingstone parliamentary by-election was bad.

"They think you are blind, so you must say no. He (HH) knows that the candidate they have brought is a wrong one and that is why they are telling people not to worry about the candidate but to worry about HH because he is a president for Southern Province.