"RB talked so much rubbish about HH, Sata and Mmembe.., RB failed to commit himself to the health workers strikes.., RB defends Dora.., RB has known Dora for a long time..., HH has never insulted RB.." This will be the news as this is what RB called the press conference for so we will be made to believe. And it is what our always misinformed public will believe.
Already, I have had many calling, sms'ing this viewpoint. I will not faulty this viewpoint, it is their opinion, but I will not hesitate to argue that as a nation we need to seriously re-assess our interpretation of policy directives that politician enunciate. It is clear, many (include so-called intellectuals) do not know what constitutes a policy directive.
To this end, I seek to argue that what tomorrow we, Zedizens, will not be told are the following policy directives ensuing from RB's enunciations.
1. There should be a legal and institutional framework for private-public partnerships in basic social infrastructure investments. This means that the fellows who had wanted to build the toll road from Leopards Hill to Chirundu, should now have an enabling framework;
2. Political leaders in public office and senior servants who have personal to holder government vehicles should not use them for personal business. The vehicles should be parked on government premises when not being used for public service;
3. Public officers (political and civil) should stop procurement of expensive vehicles;
4. Public officers (political and civil) should minimise workshops, and should endeavour to hold workshops on their premises;
5. The ACC should set up a Fraud Investigations Unit;
6. Government will set up a Financial Intelligence Unit to curb white collar crimes;
7. The ACC and Auditor General's Office should always be provided the needed financial resources; and,
8. Members of public should not hold people who are living off proceedings of crime in high esteem. The public should report such individuals.
And of course there were the administrative directives of setting up commissions, which are short term ad hoc arrangements. But, which will be THE news!
And indeed the administrative directive aimed at ensuring that those with delegated duty carry it out diligently.
These policy directives are what I captured by listening carefully to RB’s press conference, and to me they are more important than the expletives he went into during the Q and A. This is because these are directives that can found transparency and accountability if there are implemented.
The implementation challenge is not RB’s, as I know that is what many are already asking and saying. Surely, that is being naïve. Politicians DO NOT implement. The implementation challenge is for the senior public officers that administrate the public service delivery systems to translate these into practicable solutions to this country's development needs, criminality and abuse of public resources.
The challenge is for the citizen’s to hold RB accountable if these directives are not realised, and to ask “when” we should see results.
The foregoing are opportunities that any well meaning Zedizen should realise, but, unfortunately, the tragedy of our country is that these opportunities enunciated will be deemed rubbish.
A pity.
And then there was MICHAEL who 'knows' Dora 'knows' her family and 'knows' she is "dirty" and questions what RB 'knows' about Dora that we other Zambians don't 'know' with all the innuendo that the statement provokes
ReplyDeleteIf you know something and you do not tell what you know, then it is that you do not know. In short, knowledge is not knowledge unless it is shared.
ReplyDeleteAnd Z, please I love names on my blog
ReplyDeletePlease bear with me but do know that I have been considering the perspective of class very closely in order to understand our collective psyche as regards political participation. I propose that we can be understood in three basic layers - m'zungu, poor and dispossessed. With a rising number of poor, who have the potential to acquire middle class comforts we have an indication of what will happen towards 2011 as their dreams are thwarted. However, this class is not being courted by the opposition. Those being rallied are a sub-class of our poor, they are the urban dispossessed, and these must be our concern if we are to start to reverse our shared social degeneration and continued manipulation by an entrenched political class.
ReplyDelete