Zambian Watchdog LETTER TO UKWA My dear namesake ukwa: We are nearly at the half-way point in your presidency. It is now nearly 30 months since the country had the misfortune of electing you as president. All those gullible souls among the masses who you deceived with your lies and who celebrated your victory are now crying tears of sorrow. That aside, I think it is only fair and objective that a half term report is compiled on most of the major platforms that you campaigned on. Governance: 1. The constitution: I am afraid your actions can only be described as abject failure. Not only have you been found out to have told a naked lie to the Zambian people about having a new constitution in place within 90 days. But, the framework for adopting a new constitution that you yourself put in place through the technical committee has been disempowered by non other than yourself. I think it is not unfair to suggest that you stand guilty of having deceived the Zambian people in the strongest possible way on this matter. 2. Civil liberties: despite their short-comings, I think virtually nobody can argue that Zambians enjoyed unprecedented civil liberties under MMD. These are liberties that you seem hell bent on taking away despite the fact that it is this freedom of assembly and association that ushered you into office. You vanquished your political opponents against all odds in the 2011 election because of these freedoms. What therefore do you have to fear from them challenging your presidency when you now have the levers of power and the ability to win credibility through governing the country properly? By banning political rallies and gatherings are you not indirectly admitting that you are incompetent and that the opposition will show you up as such? 3. Abuse of the judiciary: the Zambian judiciary is a veritable joke at the moment. Quite clearly, it is a branch of the cartel and all major judgments at Appellate Court level have to be cleared by Fred Mmembe and Nchito. The Chikopa tribunal is a joke at every level as is the DBZ case that gave rise to it. Even your highly compromised Supreme Court could not rule in favour of Fred the Fruitcake and his boyfriend Nchito because Mutunas judgment was so full proof legally. All they could do was send it back for re-trial. Since it was essentially a procedural matter that the Supreme Court found fault with, does this not make the Chikopa tribunal unnecessary since they found nothing against Mutuna on matters of law? What misconduct are they being investigated for now may I ask? The Evans Hamaundu Tribunal of Wynter Kabimba was also laughable. One does not need to see the way the whole matter was conducted to arrive at this easy conclusion. Not only did Kabimba not do the honourable thing and resign until the Tribunal had cleared him, but lack of declaration of interests and procedural biases against the complainants were quite frankly a disgrace for the conduct of justice anywhere in the world. I hope international bar associations have taken note and will take this into account in choosing whether or not to recognize judgments passed by Hamaundu in international jurisdictions. The man is a proper embarrassment to the legal profession. It remains to be seen if anything will come out of the Masebo tribunal. My gut feeling is that she will be hung out to dry to give legitimacy to the outcome of the Kabimba tribunal. But, the amount of time it took to constitute a tribunal after William Harrington had met all the conditions is troubling. Last but not least, we have had a lady Acting as Chief Justice for longer than her stipulated allowable period under law and after being rejected by a Parliamentary Committee. This is a the top legal officer in the country who is in office illegally. What confidence can citizens have in the rule of law when the top legal officer in the country - the person who is the ultimate guardian of the Laws and the Constitution of Zambia - is occupying her office illegally? It makes no sense whatsover. In fact, there is a case for rendering all her judgments null and void as she is not a legal office holder. I hope future regimes will take this into account and international bar associations as well in recognizing judgments passed in Zambia under her acting regin as CJ. The Judiciary is a travesty at the moment and if not sorted out could result in anarchy in the country as citizens will start to take the law into their own hands as they will lose all confidence in the Judicial branch to protect their interests. The Judiciary belongs to the people of Zambia and is charged with the responsibility of protecting their interests under the laws of the country. I strongly urge you to stop adhering to the whims of that puff Fred Mmembe and his boyfriend Nchito on matters concerning the Judiciary and listen to the cries of the people about the problems in the Judiciary. They own the Judiciary not Fred Mmembe and Nchito. 4. Press conferences: quite simply we have not had one since you became president. Why is this the case? Are you scared that having to answer difficult questions may expose you for the ignorant, illiterate fool that you are? The people of Zambia gave you their vote in good faith. What is wrong with having a press conference to hear what they have to say about the way you are governing the country? This may not be a bad thing and may actually help you in improving the performance of your Government. 5. Corruption: since the ACC now has to ask your permission before they can investigate Ministers, I do wonder why it exists at all. Can an appointing authority really be taken to be an objective party in a corruption case? Furthermore, since your anointed Prince (Kabimba) effectively intimidated them by marching cadres to the ACC offices when he was facing an investigation on a corruption case, it can be said without question that the ACC is a toothless organisation. Can a toothless ACC really be a useful tool in the fight against corruption? 6. Pay for office holders: you have hiked your pay three times in under three years since becoming president. This is after criticizing Rupiah Banda for having too high of a salary when you were in opposition. Salaries for other high office holders have also been hiked. However, you have not felt fit to increase the pay of essential workers like nurses, many of whom work under extremely difficult conditions and perform important roles in keeping our citizens alive and attending to their general good health. More will be said about the firing of nurses below. I am delighted that the recent decision by senior office holders in Kenya to cut their pay has shown you up to be the selfish idiot that you are. I can only hope that you will eventually follow their example and cut your pay to more reasonable levels. Or perhaps Dr. Kaseba wardrobe isnt full enough yet... Economy: Enough time has passed for the beneficial effects of MMDs good economic management to wear off and we are now bearing the full brunt of the severe incompetence of decisions that you have made. In no particular order, the consequences are as follows: 1. A record low for the Kwacha against the US$. I dont think you can blame tapering by the US Federal Reserve because other emerging market currencies, although weaker, are nowhere at record low levels. Reckless interference in foreign exchange markets through for example SI 33 of 2012 and SI 10 of 2014 have dented confidence in the Kwacha and the countrys economy going forward and foreign investors are running for the exit door. 2. Mealie meal prices are at k 85 for a 25 kg bag in most places – even in large urban areas. You found them at k 45. Again, this reckless subsidy removal and the incredibly stupid decision to export surplus maize last year have created shortages of maize inputs and millers have passed this cost onto consumers. Sorry Ukwa, even your Socialist style price controls havent worked. See markets operate in the Real World. Businesses have to be able to cover their costs otherwise they will cease to operate. Simple. I think the reckless distribution of fertiliser this year has actually made the problem worse and we could be looking at k 120 for a 25 kg bag by August. So much for being a man of the poor. Your incompetence will probably result in the poor paying almost three times the price [you found] for their staple food. 3. Bank lending rates have come down and you must be commended for this. In theory raising capital standards for banks should have made more resources available for private business. But, your reckless and unplanned wage increases in the public sector and your equally reckless and unplanned infrastructure programmes have resulted in a crowding out of banking capital and private business being unable to take advantage of lower interest rates. 4. Mining investment is severely threatened by your unilateral intervention in labour decisions at KCM. High copper prices have meant that many in the sector have had to play along with your stupidity up until now. But, with global copper prices under pressure, the crunch will come. Many simply wont be able to maintain workforces at their current levels and, because they will not be able to lay off workers because of fear that managements may get deported, they may choose to close down altogether. Watch this space. It really will be interesting to see how you handle the inevitable labour separations that accompany low copper prices. This, and the rumoured hiking of Mineral Royalty Tax to 12%, will sound a very sure death knell for the mining industry in zambia. You heard it here first and I challenge you to prove me wrong. 5. Fuel prices - once again, because of your idiotic decision to remove subsidies, an already very high production situation in the country has become even more high cost. Those surpluses that producing businesses could have invested in expansion are now being used to fund higher fuel costs. As a result, they cant take on new workers and in some cases have had to lay off workers because their overall costs are too high. Does somebody who kills jobs really sound like a man of the poor? 6. Minimum wage - again this idiotic measure has killed new investment in the private sector. Zambia, being a high cost business environment for most things, enjoyed relatively low labour costs. With this no longer being the base, there is no good reason for anybody to invest in Zambia on account of competitive labour costs. If anything it has served to act as a significant barrier to investment and job creation. 7. Energy prices - ZESCO continues to hike tariffs without consultation and at the same time provide an atrocious service. This combination of higher costs of power and worse service is punishing producing enterprises in the country, especially farmers. Social Policy: 1. Your education interventions - the local language interventions have been an unmitigated disaster. Not only were they rolled out without proper training of teachers, a lot of children are now learning languages that are not their mother tongue. This has the potential to stoke ethnic tensions in the country if left in abeyance and one can only encourage you to suspend this programme and do a massive re-thinking of it. Whilst we should be proud of our mother tongues and cultural heritages, the fact is Bemba, Nyanja etc. is of no use to a child beyond Zambias national borders. We do live in a very globalised world and if we want children to be effective and competitive citizens in this ecosystem, it is essential that they have the tools to function effectively in workplaces. One of these is being able to speak English and at least one other international language. Because of this, rather than rolling out this stupid local languages programme, time and money would have been better spent making it mandatory for children to learn e.g. French or Portuguese as these are languages that will be of use to them as they seek to interact with other people in Africa where these languages are widely spoken. In Scandinavia and Holland for instance, it is mandatory for children to take English in primary and secondary school. Because virtually all Scandinavians and Dutch are comfortable with English, they are effective in many workplaces throughout the world. Isnt this a better example to follow to develop our youth than Wynter Kabimbas stupid local language instruction idea? Learning French I believe is the type of initiative for instance that the French government may support as part of their quest to increase the use of French in the world. In this way, it may not be a cost to the country at all as somebody else would be paying for it. 2. Firing of nurses - this probably ranks very highly among the truly stupid decisions you have taken. In a country already facing a critical shortage of medical personnel, you have chosen to exacerbate this shortage by firing experienced nurses and replacing them with recent graduates. Nursing, like many other jobs, is learned best by experience. The results of your stupid actions are there for all to see. Many unnecessary deaths have resulted from a shortage of care givers in hospitals throughout the country and the children you have put in their place are clearly ill equipped to handle the new burdens you have placed on them. I believe you need to swallow your pride on this one Ukwa and reinstate the nurses. This decision is hitting home in a very personal way as many are seeing loved ones die avoidable deaths. If this continues, it could backfire politically. International Relations: I am happy to report that after some early embarrassing moments, you at last seem to be learning how to behave at international conferences and gatherings - though your repeated references to Jacob Zumas bold head are a concern. All things considered I think there are serious short- comings here too. Three stand out: 1. You did not attend Nelson Mandelas memorial service or burial. This is an absolute disgrace which many of us have had difficulty explaining to our friends in other countries in the region. Our president is not normal is the only sensible answer we have been able to give. The memorial service for instance was an occasion of such high importance that it attracted attendance by four surviving US Presidents. Thats right, the most powerful nation on the face of this earth, sent 4/5 persons that have occupied its highest office, and we, a neighbour that has a long association with South Africas freedom struggle, did not send the head of our government but our Vice-President. The fact that no apologies have been sent or reasons given for your non-attendance has only served to stoke the angst of some South Africans against Zambia. Thankfully, most are wise enough to know that your behaviour does not reflect the feelings of Zambians but is a reflection of your stupidity as President and that of other officials in your government such as your Vice-President, which brings me nicely on 2. 2. In 2013, your muzungu opusa Vice-President insulted South Africa and South Africans in the strongest possible terms. South Africa is Zambians largest trading partner and an important diplomatic ally. This was front page news in South Africa and superseded a major scandal involving landing a plane on a military installation by one of Zumas financial backers. Scott has never apologised for this and has not attracted any censure from you. One can therefore assume that you agreed with what he said and even had the temerity to send him as the representative of the Zambian government to the funeral service of the greatest South African of them all. 3. Though you saw unfit to attend Mandelas funeral ceremonies, you saw fit to attend the lavish wedding of Mugabes daughter recently. Millions of US$ were reported to have been spent on this wedding in a country where millions starve every day. Presumably you were aware of this and sought to endorse this disgusting behaviour by one of the worlds most reviled dictators. But, it’s OK. It kind of sums you and your shallow warped mind up in a way. You dont want to bid a respectful farewell to one of the greatest statesmen of our generation. But, you see fit to attend the wedding of an international pariah who mocks his starving people by spending millions to celebrate his own birthday and that of his daughters wedding…Enough said!! Your Health: There is a lot on innuendo out there about your state of health. Nobody really knows how much of it is true and how much is lies. We do know that much in the way of financial resources has been spent to hospitalize you overseas. This coming on the back of you repeatedly criticizing Rupiah Banda, and MMD ministers, for seeking health care in the much cheaper location of South Africa and in the midst of you suggesting that there is no money to pay nurses higher salaries. If the stories are true that nearly K 2,000,000 has been spent on your medical bills overseas and in Zambia since you became president, then it is very difficult to believe that there is no money to increase the salaries of nurses because this amount can raise the pay of each of the 500 nurses you fired by K 4,000. Your Grade: These are just a few of my observations of your presidency. I havent even talked about other important issues like the colossal amounts being spent of by-elections. There is enough material however to suggest that you have been the most useless of Zambias five Presidents so far. I dont think you even warrant a grade because giving you an F for failing would be flattering you
Posted on: Thu, 20 Mar 2014 06:53:30 +0000