The Teacher

The Corruption Debate: Perhaps I am just a dreamer!

2012-02-08T07:54:00.000-08:00

Yet again, I am drawn to poke my nose into the corruption debate in this country. This time it is invoked by a comment from a Donor country, an anonymous source sent me recently, with respect to the raging debate on the so-called removed "abuse of office" clause.

The comment reads:

"The legal environment has been largely strengthened with a new Anti Corruption Act passed in 2010. There remain concerns on the removal of an illicit enrichment clause in the new Act. However, the ACC is confident that the provisions of the new Forfeiture of Proceeds of Crime ACT provide a good legal basis tackle illicit wealth, and is based on the UK model."

I guess with a change of government, whosoever this Donor is, they can not openly reiterate their position.

But I will reiterate mine. And not from "a broken mirror purview", but from a section in the new law, that is Anti-Corruption Act No. 38 of 2010, that I just stumbled on recently. (Oh! Its being reviewed again!)

Section 7. Instructions by Commission, reads in part,
(1) The Commission may instruct a public body on practices and procedures that are necessary to prevent, reduce or eliminate the occurrence of corrupt practices.
(2) A public body shall, not later than ninety days from the receipt of the instructions from the Commission pursuant to subsection (1), effect the necessary changes in its practices and procedures.
(5) The head of a public body which fails to comply with the instructions of the Commission commits an offence and is liable, upon conviction, to a fine not exceeding one hundred thousand penalty units or to imprisonment for a period not exceeding one year, or to both.
(6) In addition to the penalty prescribed in subsection (5), the head of the public body which fails to comply with the instructions of the Commission shall be subject to disciplinary action including dismissal from office by the relevant authority.

I then went into the archives to the old law, ACC Act No. 46 of 1996. The equivalent section in the reads:
Reports and recommendation by Commission
10. (1) The Commission may depending on the findings made, make such recommendation as it considers necessary to the appropriate authority.
(2) The appropriate authority shall, within thirty days from the date of such recommendation make a report to the Commission, on any action taken by such authority.

With the debate still ranging on, I could not help but wonder how Section 7 of the now being reviewed law passed in Parliament.

The question that begs answering is, why was/is this Section which provides so much power to the ACC not even in the debate on the so-called "abuse of office" clause.

Abuse of Function is a systemic failure. Surely the ACC should be more proactive and invoke this Section as a means of curbing the scourge. A controlling officer that allows abuse of function should be requested to curb the practice, and if not, the ACC has the powers to act under this Section.

And, how can a State and its people (not forgetting the tin-can CSOs) not have realised that this Section can curb the year-in-year out issues of un-retired imprest if some controlling officers were locked up for failing to put corrective measures in place.

But, I guess, perhaps I am just a dreamer!

The Barotse Question - Edifying the “Interested Citizen”

2012-02-05T01:53:00.000-08:00

In the Zambia Daily Mail of Thursday, February 2, 2012 in response to my article titled Barotse Question: A dialectic failure of reason of January 24, 2012, a fellow citizen under the nom de guerre of “interested citizen”, raised questions I here seek to address.

First, I am pleased to read that “interested citizen” pleaded innocence to the inexcusable crime of ignorance of political historic contexts that evidence the evolution of African nation-States like the one we call Zambia. Any one who so seeks to understand why they call themselves Zambian or whatever other nationality they deem fit should surely take time to read their history. A song that comes to mind in this respect is Robert Nesta "Bob" Marley’s, Buffalo Soldier where he sings: “If you know your history, Then you would know where you coming from, Then you wouldn't have to ask me, Who the 'eck do I think I am”.

History lost, it is thence understandable that “interested citizen”, in some way, is asking who the heck do they think they are? “Interested citizen”, further asks, what the heck is Barotseland and its boundaries thereof? Above all, “interested citizen” asks what the heck is the Barotse Question?

Thus, to edify “interested citizen”, the Barotse Question is simply an explanation of the fundamental reasons underlying the quest for the restoration of the Barotse Agreement. There are two dominant theses on this issue, and notably they are not founded on the infinitesimal question of boundaries. These are: (1) sustenance of a sense of belonging to a traditionally and colonially recognised politically and historically defined nationhood; and (2) a sense of socio-economic and political exclusion (or marginalisation) in the post-colonial State, which in Africa is mostly an assemblage of ethnic groups that were defined as a nation by the colonial masters[1].

These two theses defining the Barotse Question provide us a framework for addressing “interested citizens” questions of what the heck is Barotseland and who the heck do they think they are. This is because they address the validity of the nature of influences that determine when the Barotse “people’s wishes” necessitate assertion of self-rule as presumed to be promulgated in the Agreement[2].

Significantly, the Barotse sense of nationhood is historically recognised. For instance, Gerald Caplan in his book “Elites of Barotseland” observes that “Barotseland had existed as an independent national entity long before the creation of Northern Rhodesia, and was legally and historically entitled to maintain or dissolve the attachment as its people wished”. The underlying assumption here is that that Barotseland self-rule is an inviolable entitlement that the people of Barotseland have held over time. The continuance of this entitlement before the independence of the then Northern Rhodesia, and amalgamation of Barotseland into the State of Zambia, is evidenced in the Barotseland Agreement of May 18, 1964.

To which end, historically, there have been attempts to assert this entitlement. Notable attempts include that in 1907, when King Lewanika requested the British Government that Barotseland protectorate be removed from North Western Rhodesia and company rule and be given the same status as Bechuanaland (Botswana). And in 1921, when King Yeta III presented Prince Arthur of Connaught a petition that, in the main, demanded direct rule of the Imperial Government as a protected native state over the entire territory known as Barotseland North-Western Rhodesia.

In 1953, Barotseland was declared a ‘protectorate within the protectorate’, during the processes of the federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland. Barotseland’s sovereignty was recognised in section 112 of the Constitution of Northern Rhodesia.

On May 18, 1964, the Barotseland Agreement was signed (for lack of newspaper space I advise “interested citizen” reads the first paragraph of the Agreement). The agreement provided the governance and legitimacy framework for the creation of the independent sovereign State of Zambia. In short, the Agreement recognised a people’s a sense of belonging to a traditionally and colonially recognised politically and historically defined nationhood.

Thus, the Barotseland Agreement of 1964 evidences the first thesis on the Barotse Question, which is sustenance of a sense of belonging to a traditionally and colonially recognised politically and historically defined nationhood. Interestingly, the Laws of Zambia consistently give due recognition to the autonomy of Barotseland as they acknowledge the existence of a Barotse Native Authority. There is no other group of people in Zambia politically and historically recognised as such.

However, derogations of the Barotseland Agreement are argued to chiefly include the 1969 Constitution Amendment Act and the Western Province (Land and Miscellaneous Provisions) Act, with the former abolishing all rights, obligation and liabilities attached to the agreement, and the latter disinvesting the Litunga of his powers over land in the province as it vested all land in Barotseland in the President of Zambia.

The second explanation of the fundamental reasons underlying the quest for the restoration of the Barotse Agreement or what is termed the Barotse Question is a sense of socio-economic and political exclusion (or marginalisation. This, I have consistently argued is a fallacy and a mere parody for political opportunism. Hence I write somewhere, “That Western province is the poorest and least developed province in Zambia is not a subject of debate, but that it should be acknowledged that all rural Zambia has comparatively been neglected for some time in our country’s development history”.

In addition, I have further argued that over time in post-independent Zambia’s history there is no ethno-region that can argue that they have been underrepresented in the political governance of Zambia. For instance, Lindemann’s governance representative indices by regional groupings and or ethnic groupings in the period 1964 to 2008 do not show significant ethnic marginalisation, though variances are observable[3]. Unfortunately, this is not the case today, as even evidenced by the Catholic Bishops concern on this score.

In retrospect, I hope up to this stage I have edified who the heck do they think they are; what the heck is Barotseland, and what the heck is the Barotse Question?

“Interested citizens” other questions, are “what really is the Barotse Question in today’s Zambia (just indicate the request or demand) and who are affected in terms of geographical boundaries”.

First, having outlined the paradigm of the Barotse Question, I hope “interested citizen” can now surmise that who is affected is simply who has a sense of belonging to a traditionally and colonially recognised politically and historically defined nationhood. In any case, a nation is nothing much but an evolution of historical romanticism! So the boundaries of Barotseland at any one point in history are simply defined by a historic and political sense of belonging. Period.

Second, what is the request or demand? The request or demand is inviolably inherent in the Barotse Question’s thesis. That is sustenance of a sense of belonging to a traditionally and colonially recognised politically and historically defined nationhood; and a sense of socio-economic and political exclusion (or marginalisation) in the post-colonial State.

To which end, if we so understand this thesis, the question is NOT what is the request or demand, but what does the Barotse Question teach us in today’s Zambia? The answer is simply that the Barotse Question and its see-saw resurgence (thereof) provides us an interrogation of the usurpation of the traditionalists autonomy and privileges during the country’s State-building process. But critical of all, it simply calls onto to us to rethink as to whether our centralist approaches to political and economic governance address the sense of belonging to a traditionally and colonially recognised politically and historically defined nationhood and the sense of socio-economic and political exclusion (or marginalisation) concerns of our population.

The “Barotse Question is simply an affirmation of the need for equitably determined developmental entitlements, and elite bargaining based on social group or regional representation; and that the Barotse Question’s derived governance paradigm is one of inclusive models of political governance structures of devolution of power, as a means of allowing for more regional representative structures of government” (Mbinji 2011).

In short, the Barotse Question the request or demand (if we so wish to put it that way) provides a framework for devolution of power to the regions. It provides the State of Zambia the opportunity for a non-dichotomous governance system, which can integrate traditional and customary governance frameworks under which the majority of the rural populations exist.

In conclusion, if we so now understand the Baroste Question, we should then understand that it is a governance paradigm that can mitigate influences that can likely determine when a “people’s wishes” necessitate assertion of self-rule or secession, as it is a reconciliatory paradigm of the historic divide between today’s political elites and traditionalists.

After all, the Barotse Question is just a product of the rural poverty vis-à-vis political governance representation disconnect evident in Zambia.

For more reading on the Barotse Question, please visit http:// http://miliko.vacau.com/ and http://mbinjimufalo.blogspot.com/

[1] Mbinji M., (2011), Re-Examining the Argument for the Restoration of the Barotseland Agreement, A paper presentation to the Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD) National Conference on Traditional Authorities, Decentralisation and Rural Development, Lusaka, Zambia.

[2] Ibid

[3] Lindemann, S., (2010), Inclusive elite bargains and civil war avoidance: The case of Zambia, Crisis States Working Papers Series No.2.

The Barotse Question - A dialectic failure of reason

2012-01-20T13:43:00.000-08:00

Now that the Barotseland Agreement is in the open domain, already there are comments being made that border on extreme intellectual deficiency in understanding historic contexts of the evolution of nation-States in Africa. In any case, could be this is because such individuals never made any attempt in the past to understand the evolution of the nation-State we call Zambia. And this is, because if they did, they would have unearthed the Barotseland Agreement decades ago. The document has been in the public domain on the World Wide Web (what is erroneously called the internet) for decades.

With its undoubtedly welcome politically initiated release, it is clear that there are many in our country who do not understand the context of the Barotse Question or who merely seek to be blind to the objective facts. It is an inarguable dialectic failure of reason to assume that as a people, we ourselves gave unto ourselves the nation-State we call Zambia.

No we did not! Sic.

A comment that made me take pen to paper is an assertion that the Barotse Question is tribal. The sentiment went further to assert that Lozis are tribalists. Not much very different from the excruciating political rhetoric that Tongas are tribalists! But, in the context of the Barotse Question there is a difference.

First, Lozi is not a tribe. It is a complex language group. It is rather unfortunate that a language can be imputed to be tribal. How possible is that, when Lozi comprises dialect/language groups that include Kwangwas, Luyanas, Subiyas, Makomas, Nkoya (which is a language constituting Mashasha, Lushange, Lukolwe, Mbwela), Nyengos, Mbundas, Mashi, Mbowe, Kwandi, Mbukushu, Simaa, and Totela?

For instance, Lozis like Makomas and Subiya can only understand each other in Lozi (which is a Sesotho dialect). These groups were either subjugated by the assumed superior group the Luyanas/Kwangwa or did seek protection, thereof. Thus constituting what was historical called the Kingdom of Barotseland.

Dialectically, how often do we hear of a Welsh or Scot saying the English are tribalists? Why is the term tribe not often used among Europeans? Does it mean there are no tribes in Europe?

To which end, I have consistently reasoned that the term tribe has historically only being used to refer to colonised, oppressed, or subjugated groups of people. The term tribe has a negative connotation. It is a term that historically was used to refer to what was perceived as inferior groups of people. That, as Africans we have continued using the term basically reflects an assumption of superiority by one group or the other. It is a term that we even use in political competition to appeal to a sense of one's assumed tribal superiority and the legitimate claim to rule others.

How often, have we come across expressions like "I can not be ruled by a Tonga, Lozi or Luvale"? Exactly what is the connotation of such expressions?

Second, with respect to the Barotseland Agreement, the recognition of the Kingdom of Barotseland, by the very colonisers to whom we today euphorically ascribe our existence as a nation dates as far back as 1890. For instance on June 27, 1890, King Lewanika I and the British South Africa Company signed the Frank Lochner Treaty resulting in Barotseland becoming a British protectorate.

Another record worth mention is the 1905 Barotseland Boundary Case between Britain and Portugal, which explicitly observes that, “For the purposes of the arbitration the expression the territory of the Barotse Kingdom shall mean the territory over which the King of Barotse was paramount ruler on the June 11, 1891”. This case was arbitrated by Victor Emmanuel III, King of Italy on May 30, 1905, and basically considered the determination of the limits of the territory of the Barotse Kingdom.

Thence, they should not be any shred of doubt in any reasonable individual to accept that the very colonisers who defined the boundaries of the State we call Zambia, are the ones that recognised that there was a traditional nation called Barotseland and a British South African territory called Northern Rhodesia. At no time in our history was there any other territory recognised as a nation, other than Barotseland.

Without showing disdain, can any of the individuals that are pooh-poohing or spurning the existence of a Barotse nation before the existence of Zambia, show historic evidence of any such language group in Zambia that was recognised as a defined territory in the 1800s or even in the pre-independence period?

Perhaps, research should be done to evidence which other ethnic groupings in today's Zambia were recognised as such by the colonisers. And, indeed how many even have a national anthem!

Retrospectively, I thus write somewhere that "Xenophobia is a tragic failure of reason of which space it is after all, we even kill for". And, in "The Barotse Question - Epitomising historical romanticism? I note that, "Our nation-State existence is an illusion of well-being in a geographic space defined by forces that knew little of existing social spaces”.

To conceive the Barotseland Agreement as "a whole load of nonsense" is not only unfortunate, but a failure to recognise the evolution of the State of Zambia. I always find it obtuse that as Africans we often run to talk of the spaces we call our States without realising that these were basically defined by Europeans that in most cases did not take cognisance of already existing ethno-realities. However, at least in the evolution of the Barotseland Agreement they did. How many of us even ask as to why Caprivi, despite having ethno similarities to Barotseland is part of Namibia and not Zambia. So how then can it be so difficult to comprehend the Barotse Question?

Sincerely, how can a sense of nationhood that was recognised by the very colonisers that "manufactured" Zambia be construed as tribalism?

Let us not delude ourselves, the Barotse Question is simply a governance paradigm that in all fairness should “serve to provide a dialectic framework for interrogating political and public service governance representation within a diverse and dichotomous population”.

For more reading from Mbinji Mufalo on the Barotse Question, please read:
1) "Re-Examining the Argument for the Restoration of the Barotseland Agreement" at [http://miliko.vacau.com/barotseQ.htm]
2) "The Barotse Question - Epitomising historical romanticism?" [http://mbinjimufalo.blogspot.com/2010/10/barotse-question-epitomising-historical.html]

Endnote: This is an adaptation of a FaceBook comment I made on a fellow citizen’s comment on the Barotse Question, on January 20, 2012

The Barotse Question - Ashes of History?

2011-12-28T00:03:00.000-08:00

The Barotse Question is embodied in the restoration of the Barotseland Agreement. Today, it merits interrogation as to the validity of the nature of influences that determine when “a sense of Lozi nationhood” arouses demands of self-rule as presumed to be proclaimed in the Agreement.

Clearly, a dichotomous citizenry has always emerged in post-colonial States in Africa. There is the citizenry whose sense of belonging to the new State is subsumed more by their allegiance to the traditionally and culturally defined nationhood. And there is the citizenry whose sense of belonging to the new State is subsumed more by a sense of socio-economic and political inclusion. In Zambia, the former are mostly the rural populations who live in areas where traditional authority is still the dominant governance authority with respect to livelihood entitlements. And, the latter are the urban populations who live in areas where statutory authority defining the State is dominant.

In a democracy like Zambia there is an assumption that both ends of this citizenry dichotomy have controlling influence on the decisions and affairs of government, and that there will be equitable and equal socio-economic development. To which end, dissent to a sense of belonging to a State premised on a sense of socio-economic and political exclusion (or marginalisation) should not arise.

Yet, in the Barotse Question it has!

The Barotse Question calls upon us to accept that in pre-colonial times only a few of our ethnic groups had politically centralised chieftainships with developed bureaucracies. Lozis have always had a sense of Lozi national consciousness.

The re-emergence of the Barotse Question today is politically claimed to be because of a sense of socio-economic and political exclusion (or marginalisation). That Western province is the poorest and least developed province in Zambia, is not a subject of debate. But, it should also be acknowledged that all rural Zambia has comparatively been neglected for sometime in our country’s development history, is also not a subject of debate. There is an evident rural-urban dichotomy relative to the social-economic status the country’s population.

In short, rural Zambia has always been short-changed!

The question then is why is this so, if we hold valid the assumption that “access to positions of political and administrative power is important for competing social groups in that it provides them with visible recognition, a ‘say’ in decision making and control over government resources”.

In this respect, can it be assumed that rural populations are under represented in our democratic governance representative framework? Or can it be assumed that inequities in governance representation at the national level have produced inequalities at the regional levels?

On the contrary, governance representative indices by regional and or ethnic groupings in periods of the years 1964 to 2008 do not show significant ethnic marginalisation, though variances are observable. Governance representation in Zambia has been void of inequities likely to cause ethnic dissent in the dominant ethnic groups. This has been a result of Kenneth Kaunda’s policy of ‘tribal balancing’, and its continuance.

The objective facts of this representativeness is a trend that is not commensurate with the obtaining poverty levels in rural Zambia, as most ethnical groups have had relatively equitable representativeness, and yet the evident results of this equitable representativeness is abject poverty for most of the populations in rural Zambia.

Therefore, it is clear that in Zambia, equality at the ‘political elite level’ has produced inequalities at the regional level. To which end, the assumption that “leaders with access to positions of state power will tend to redistribute to their ‘own’ social groups”, as the mainstream argue on the case of poverty in Western province is sophism.

In addition, that the re-emergence of the Barotse Question is because of a sense of socio-economic and political exclusion (or marginalisation), is merely a travesty of reason. The Barotse Question should be rationalised by the sense of belonging to a historically and colonially recognised traditionally defined nationhood, and the consequent Lozi national consciousness.

Admittedly, the Barotse Question has over the years been used as a tool for a more representative national governance mode. Thus, a see-saw semblance of Barotse sentiments is evident whenever Lozis feel marginalised.

It should be understood that, the critical elements of the Barotseland Agreement of May, 1964 are a definition of the terms under which the Litunga of Barotseland assented to Barotseland protectorate’s merger with Northern Rhodesia protectorate to create the new nation-State called Zambia. Dominant of which are the continued protection and respect by the government of Zambia of the obligations and rights contained in treaties and concessions between the British government and Barotseland, and that the “customary law of Barotseland shall be the principal local authority for the government and administration of Barotseland”, and that the Litunga of Barotseland, acting after consultation with his Council, shall be authorised and empowered to make laws for Barotseland in relation to the matters that include the Litungaship; the Barotse Government; local government land; forests; traditional and customary matters relating to Barotseland alone; the institution at present known as the Barotse native treasury; and local taxation.

Thus, the Barotseland Agreement manifests a superfluity of governance paradigms. These are:

(a) Quest for self-rule as evidenced in the affirmation of asserting protection and respect by the government of Zambia of the obligations and rights contained in treaties and concessions between the British government and Barotseland protectorate, which duly recognised that Barotseland was an autonomous colonised nation within another colonised nation;

(b) Monarchic form of governance where kingship is duly asserted as evidenced in the Agreement’s affirmation that the “customary law of Barotseland shall be the principal local authority for the government and administration of Barotseland”, and that the Litunga of Barotseland, acting after consultation with his Council, shall be authorised and empowered to make laws for Barotseland, evidences recognition of a monarchic form of governance as kingship is duly asserted. Due recognition should however be made that Barotseland had over time developed an inclusive form of traditional governance, despite royal heredity being supreme to the subjects; and,

(c) Federalism, as the Agreement also provides the government of Zambia sovereignty over Barotseland on the administration of justice; the public service; fiscal responsibility, administration and economic development of Barotseland[1]; and leasehold land administration.

The Agreement thus recognises Barotseland’s quasi-sovereignty of self-rule and preservation of a monarchic governance system. But, the delegation of powers to the central government over certain matters in Barotseland provides a dichotomy of governance. This dichotomy is self-rule within a monarchy; and, federalism.

In short, the character of the State of Zambia that should have evolved out of the Barotseland Agreement is a federal state. In this respect, an attempt should be made to understand the quest for self-rule in this context. In any case, for traditionalists, the sense of belonging to a historically and colonially recognised traditionally defined nationhood, and the consequent Lozi national consciousness, dates far beyond the Frank Lochner Treaty of 1890.

Further, the Barotse Question’s perseverance is sustained by the dichotomous nature of political governance in Zambia, which is rooted in the country’s State-building process. The country’s political governance has evolved from a pendulum of polarity between traditionalists and nation-State building advocates or what have been termed nationalists.

There always have been the traditionalists and the nationalists, and this has historically being more pronounced in Western province, than in any other province in Zambia. Whereas the traditionalists sought to preserve their customary and or traditional authority over their subjects within an independent State, the nationalists (mostly urban subjects) favoured the creation of a more cohesive State that recognised boundaries of colonial domination of peoples with similar aspirations, traditions and culture.

Consequently, the resulting political governance has been one of political and public service elitism, which has not served the socio-economic interests of most of the populations in rural Zambia that still live under traditional modes of governance.

In retrospect, the Barotse Question is not ashes of history, nor is it an inane emotional attachment to historical romanticism. Its re-emergence, can in part, be attributable to the usurpation of the traditionalists autonomy and privilege during the country’s State-building process.

Therefore, it is here argued that the Barotse Question provides a governance re-think. This is based on the fact that:

(a) The country’s political and public service elites have not substantively equitably determined development entitlements; and that,

(b) There is no elite bargaining based on social group or regional representation.

The Barotse Question lends credence to the fact that historical events shape inter-regional relations within a centralised State. The Barotse Question provides the State of Zambia the opportunity for a non-dichotomous governance system, which can integrate traditional and customary governance frameworks under which the majority of the rural populations exist.

A governance re-think premised on the Barotse Question is simply an affirmation of the need for equitably determined development entitlements, and elite bargaining based on social group or regional representation. After all, every region has its own history, traditions and culture, in addition to peculiar political, social and economic problems.

In conclusion, the derivative political governance paradigm from the Barotse Question is federalism with its consequent self-rule for the regions.

Federalism is a reconciliatory political governance structure that recognises historic, traditional and cultural diversity. It is a governance paradigm that can provide government space for statutory institutionalisation of traditional and customary authority, which is inarguably integral to the Barotse Question. Federalism provides equitable local and central political and administrative representation, which is critical for populations characterised by historic, traditional and cultural diversity.

The Barotse Question is a product of the rural poverty vis-à-vis political governance representation disconnect evident in Zambia. It is not a parody for political opportunism!

Endnote: Edited version of Re-Examining the Argument for the Restoration of the Barotseland Agreement

[1] Article 7., Financial Responsibility, The Government of the Republic of Zambia shall have the same general responsibility for providing financial support for the administration and economic development of Barotseland as it has for other parts of the Republic and shall ensure that, in discharge of this responsibility, Barotseland is treated fairly and equitably in relation to other parts of the Republic.

A world without Susan

2011-11-17T03:42:00.000-08:00

- A testimonial on the world of Kasisi children’s Home

There are places we walk to, not because we want to be there, but because our inner humanity draws us there. And there are worlds we come to belong, not because we belong, but because those in these worlds welcome us with heavenly grace. We come to dwell in these worlds, and we come to find in them a sanctuary of our troubled lives.

In our despair, troubles, and in our fear of losing our inner humanity, these worlds come to be a home in which we find love and understanding. But above all, it is in these worlds that we find inspiration and meaning to our existence. And that meaning, I have come to learn is simply a living cenotaph of what our inner humanity should be. Love of our fellow human beings. A love graced by God.

A love beyond words of tongue and pen.

Yes, a love that hangs timelessly in the starlit dark night during the nightmares of our despair, troubles and fears.

Through a calling that for years now, there are some that have tried in vain to understand and reason why they walked into such worlds. Looking back, they have no regrets that they did, even though sometimes it has hurt their social and professional relationships. Infatuation, obsession, are words many have come to use in their infantile attempt to understand why there are some that walk into such worlds and end up belonging.

What many of them do not understand is that we do not live our lives for ourselves. Our lives belong to God and all that he created in his image. And when we walk into worlds apart from ours, and in which we find inspiration, love and understanding, we should understand that our lives become a greater meaning beyond our fascination with ourselves.

We can not be, without being in another. Our world has no meaning if we do not listen to our inner humanity, for our inner humanity always dwells in worlds apart from us.

Yesterday, November 16, 2011, I attended a seraphic and melancholic burial service for Susan. It was unlike any other burial service, I have ever attended. There were no dressed up men and women in black. No loudly mourning women. No fancy long luxury car procession. And no expensive hearse carrying an expensive coffin. No open grave with marquees and chairs. No preacher men howling heavenly damnation on us.

And, yes. No somebodies, nobodies and jackanapes wanting to be remembered that they attended the burial service. In all the multitudes of somebodies, nobodies and jackanapes that attend many a funeral I have been to, only a smattering attends because their inner humanity drew them to the departed. For most it is merely a routine social ritual of “paying their respect”. “Paying ones respect”, is an adage I am yet to find meaning for.

Susan’s burial service was different. It was orphic, for Susan dwelled in a world apart from most of us. A world in which to most, our ability to dwell in our inner humanity is simply a delusion of our times of assumed understanding of the love of God.

As I watched the mother-provincial say the last prayers, and the children lay flowers on Susan’s small grave, I looked into the yonder blue skies with melancholic deference. I never knew I was so privileged to have happened to be in this world again.

In reminiscent moments of Susan’s world, I recalled the times Susan would smile at me in recognition. I recalled how in other lonely times and wishful longings, I would tell myself that tomorrow I will tell Susan to talk to me, stand up and walk with us. There were times, I thought of myself as having powers beyond humanity. And there was always the dream, that with God’s grace and the love in Susan’s world, tomorrow she will surely walk with us.

All her life, Susan did not talk, walk with us, nor did Susan ran and play with us. But Susan dwelled in a world that loved, cherished, and nurtured her. The inner humanity that dwells in her world, shone down on her like candlelight in a stormy dark rainy night. Sometimes, I think Susan beamed with an understanding and love that should surely draw us to realise that she was not asking for more.

Susan was happy.

In hindsight, it is me that is not happy, not Susan. Susan dwelled in a serene world, a celestial palimpsest of an inner humanity which many can not touch. My dreams of having Susan walk and run with us, were merely a futile aspiration of thinking my world is the world Susan also desired. How it be, I could be so wrong.

Indeed, how it be, I could no decipher the eternal meaning of children laying flowers on an unmarked small grave? How it be, I did not read in Susan’s smile that her world is as the world should be.

Yes, a world where our despair, troubles and fears dwell not in the sanctity of our inner humanity. That unknowingly we parade our despair, troubles and fears like clowns in a carnival, merely serves to enhance our inability to walk with the angels. Indeed, the parade merely serves to reflect our unreasoned fear of walking into better worlds.

Susan’s world is a world we can not live apart. It is our world. For Susan did not come from a God apart from us. Susan, like us, is a child of God, and her world is how our world should be.

Tomorrow, as we walk and run with those we so proclaim to love, let us know that if yesterday we did not dwell in Susan’s world, then we dwell not in the sanctity of God. We are merely a delusion of the inner humanity that God so bestowed on us.

To all those that came before me, and those that shall come after me, I call unto your inner humanity to realise that there can never be a world without Susan.

Susan is us, and may her soul rest in everlasting peace.

Dora & Zamtel Inquiry - An Unnecessary Tautology?

2011-10-25T10:11:00.000-07:00

Well, just when I was about to let my brain enjoy its stay outside my body, a perusal of the country's news media made me decide it is better solemnly admiring me from the outside. That way, I wont have to hit the keyboard with musical reason. Although, my brain is scary when outside my head, I am safer that way as I am protected from the many unreasoned innuendos friends make about my opinions. Hey, but do I care! Their opinions are theirs and I respect them, though some appear to be a majuscule exemplification of infantile reasoning.

And I assert this because it is clear in my mind that they do not know that we should treat those that disrespected us, tortured us, or maimed us, with dignity and respect. Not because we are afraid that if we did not, we too will be treated the same when our time comes. But because it is the only way, we can show that we are more humane than them.

I have no doubt in my mind that in their infantile reasoning the recognition of the inviolability of human dignity dwells beyond the stars. They can not touch. I wonder, if at any one point in their infantile reasoning and melancholic savouring of what they deem "our time to show/get them" they do recognise that courts of law provide even the most despicable criminal the human dignity because he or she is simply a human being.

And this bring me to the subject of this blog. I read that the Commission of Inquiry tasked to investigate the sale of Zamtel and Finance Bank (see end note 1) has asked Former Communications Minister Dora Siliya to appear before it and answer allegations levelled against her over the sale of Zamtel. Unfortunately, our obtuse media has so far not attempted to provide us what these allegations are this time round. In addition, a perusal of the relevant government agencies and State House website does not also provide information on this Commission.(Perhaps, I should learn to accept that we are not yet in the digital age).

So I beg to be allowed to surmise that it is the same allegations that led to the constitution of the Tribunal of February 25, 2009 appointed by the Chief Justice under Section 13 (3) of the Parliamentary and Ministerial Code of Conduct Act, Chapter 16 of the Laws of Zambia following complaints lodged by William Harrington and a consortium of ten (10) NGOs.

The relevant allegation to today's Commission of Inquiry on Zamtel sale, I surmise is that Dora Siliya "against the advice of the Attorney General did award a contract of the sum of US$ 2,000,000 to R.P Capitals Partners of Cayman Island to value the ZAMTEL assets without due regard and / or compliance with the provisions of the Zambia National Tender Board Act, Chapter 394 of the Laws of Zambia"; and that, "she on December 22, 2008 signed a Memorandum of Understanding with R.P Capital Partners Limited on behalf of the Government of Zambia, against the Legal advice of the Attorney General’s chambers".

Further that, in so doing she breached Section 4 (a) and (c) of the Parliamentary and Ministerial Code of Conduct Act.

The Tribunal then made the following findings:
1. That allegation one which has been proved does not fall under Part II of the Parliamentary and Ministerial Code of Conduct Act.
2. That she breached Article 54 sub Article 3 of the Constitution.Article 54(3) provides that "Subject to the other provisions of this Constitution, an agreement, contract, treaty, convention or document by whatever name called, to which Government is a party or in respect of which the Government has an interest, shall not be concluded without the legal advice of the Attorney-General, except in such cases and subject to such conditions as Parliament may by law prescribe".

These allegations, can be argued to be fact and today we do not need parties to go to the Commission and sing the same dog eared song. The findings, though contested (as evidenced in the court cases that ensued) can provide a basis of today's inquiry.

Noteworthy, on the findings is that, I wrote at the time on this blog, in A Disfigurement of Political Opportunities, that it is surely a historic feat that Rupiah Banda can pick a hammer and hit the nail closing his own coffin. It is frightening that a leader can re-appoint a publicily (not legally) unaccepted person. The Dora Siliya re-appointment is amidst overwhelming public discontent with Rupiah Banda's leadership, and it surely is evidential of unfounded political arrogance. This is a time when the few good men left in our political governance institution of cabinet should show their moral mantle(if they do), by stepping down in disagreement with this one act of political foolery and arrogance... The question that begs to be answered and now left to innuendo and speculation is - Whose interests is Rupiah Banda really serving? (http://mbinjimufalo.blogspot.com/2009/06/disfigurement-of-political.html)

Today, if it is agreed that the findings of the tribunal are objective, then the question we should be asking is what is the recourse (see end note 2), and not allowing ourselves to have a circus of rhetoric. This only provides those submitting, the media space that they would otherwise not have.

In my warped perspective of this issue, I here assert that what today the country should be concentrating on, is whether Dora's actions constituted a criminal offence. And, I here hasten to assert that, this is not the purview of a Commission of Inquiry, unless, this one Commission can rationalise itself by adducing reason based on the gaps in the Tribunal and the court judgements that were made relative to this issue! To ask Dora to repeat herself, instead of seeking clarification as to what she may not have said at the time, can be argued to be a denial of rationality. So too, is having individuals submitting a dog eared repertoire of statements that are already known! And that such repetitions and dog eared repertoire of statements can be headline news is harrowing.

Thus, to ascertain that Dora's actions constituted a criminal offence, we need not look further than Section 99, Abuse of authority of office of the Penal Code Act of the Laws of Zambia. Section 99(1) provides that "Any person who, being employed in the public service, does or directs to be done, in abuse of the authority of his office, any arbitrary act prejudicial to the rights or interests of the Government or any other person, is guilty of a misdemeanour. If the act is done or directed to be done for purposes of gain, he is guilty of a felony and is liable to imprisonment for three years". And the provisions of the AC Act on Corrupt practices by,or with, public officers; Corrupt transactions by, or with,private bodies; Corrupt use of official power; and, Coercion of investor.

To which end, the reasoning that should rationalise any new inquiry or investigation in the Zamtel sale should be whether Dora acted in a manner prejudicial to the rights or interests of the Government and or whether in the Zamtel transaction there was personal gain that accrued to her. And this, is an interrogative framework for law enforcement agencies.

Thus, it can be arguable that the constitution of this Commission of Inquiry is simply an unnecessary tautology evidencing infantile fixation with the past. It is seriously time, law enforcement agencies and governance institutions in this country are allowed the professional space to provide answers to public officials behaviours deemed to be inimical to the State.

Commissions of Inquiries are quite often merely political opportunistic tools that simply serve to provide an assumption that a government is functioning. In addition, in an environment permeated with infantile reasoning, Commission of Inquiries can also be argued to serve to promote egoistic behaviours that in the long term negate the very essence of the Inquiry.

Let it not be undoubted that considering Dora's role in the Zamtel sale in a law enforcement interrogative framework will serve to enhance public confidence in law enforcement agencies, and indeed provide inarguable evidence of effective State functioning.

The bottom line, therefore, is that we should simply have let law enforcement agencies go to work and build a prima facie case against Dora!

Ciao. I can now allow my brain back outside my head. Good night.

End Note 1. Well, sale of Finance Bank has been reversed before the Commission submits its report. So I hope nobody will make submissions on this issue. Perhaps, then we will save public funds as the sittings will be brief.

End Note 2. Interestingly, in the recess of my memory there is a case of someone else signing an MoU on behalf of the State, but it was not an issue then. Wonder why?

A Bankruptcy of Reason

2011-10-22T17:26:00.000-07:00

Today, is yet another turning point in my attempt to understanding the African psyche, and in particular the so-called educated Zambians ability to reason. Another Task force on Corruption is emerging, and as I had said years ago, I say it again. "It is hogwash, especially if again we allow private individuals to pretend that they are the epitome of anti-corruption".

And in the normal bankruptcy of reason typic of so-called educated Zambians, I was put in a partisan box. "You are pro-RB, that is why you are against a task force".

Pity, is the only word on my mind. Pity. And deep down I ask myself, if ever in their melancholic times they remember Mukelabai Mukelabai. I guess they do not.

To argue against a failed path, does not necessarily mean one belongs to a particular interest group. Very often, I always ask myself why it is that humans can never accept that there are those that sit in the middle, and that it is these that provide objectivity to illogical derivations.

A task force with private individuals is not a panacea to corruption. It is merely a means of enriching a few non-state agents at the expense of diminishing confidence in often qualified public law enforcement and prosecution agents.

Lest we forget, the late President's Chiluba's immunity to criminal prosecution was lifted on the basis of mostly allegations that US $20.5 million dollars for arms purchases was diverted from the public coffers for personal benefit as the arms were never procured, and that in October 1997 a legally binding contract was entered into between the Zambian government and the Carlington Sales Company for supply of 100 000 metric tons of white corn at a cost of US$6 million, but the maize was never delivered!

In our dossier on corruption at that time, two interesting names had surfaced. These being Ari Beni Menashe and Katebe Katoto.

And based on our conviction that a President's alleged tango with such individuals provided adducible evidence of corruption, we marched to parliament to lobby for the removal of Chiluba's immunity.

For those that document events in our country, they will recall that they was conflict between State agents and private individuals as to how Chiluba should be charged. A conflict that was not necessary, as the grounds for lifting the immunity provided a basis on which the former President could be prosecuted.

A Task Force on Corruption was thus created. And the earlier grouping was premised on inter-agency law enforcement cooperation. Notable is that the then DPP, Mukelebai Mukelebai, initially chaired the Task Force. Qualified personnel to constitute a dedicated investigative team were seconded from the Zambia Police Service, Anti-Corruption Commission and other specialised agencies of Governments like Auditor General’s office, Bank of Zambia, Director of Public Prosecutions’ Chambers, Cabinet Office, Government Valuation Department and Zambia Intelligence and Security Services.

Unfortunately, it can be argued that an incumbent President appeared to be under siege, and thus the conflict resulted in a diligent Public Prosecutor being hounded out of office (despite an inquiry not finding him guilty of private interest alleged wrongful conduct).

A parody of anti-corruption emerged from the private interest, and indeed the pursuit of geopolitical interests from some western countries resulting in private individuals usurping Governmental functions. Individuals outside governmental frameworks even ended up signing Task Force MoUs with some Donor countries with the full knowledge that the Task Force on Corruption was not an agency that could appropriate public funds other than through cooperating agencies.

The end result was that Chiluba ended up in court being charged with crimes that were not entirely the basis of the removal of his immunity. The Ari Beni Menashe and Katebe Katoto alleged dealing never constituted cases against Chiluba!

Instead the Zambian populace and indeed the international community were treated to a repertoire of a plunder matrix (in part premised on the ZAMTROP account) that was reduced to several counts of theft by Public Servant Contrary to sections 272 and 277 of the Penal Code, Cap. 87 of the Laws of Zambia.

And of course the rest is history. However, the bottom line is the Task Force under Mwanawasa was inarguably a usurpation of State functions by the private interest, and this we today can not allow.

That there is a Task Force on Corruption to be created is not disputable, what is disputable is that Government does not necessarily need to create a Task Force in the lines of the one we experienced as a country. To even use the word Task Force on Corruption is preposterous!

The country's law enforcement agencies have cooperative frameworks defined under the National Anti-Corruption Policy of 2009. After all a declaration of anti-corruption cooperation was signed by law enforcement agencies in Siavonga in 2009.

To which end, it is incumbent on the current Government to show anti-corruption leadership by providing the political will and increased governmental support to law enforcement agencies within a governmental framework of a joint and cooperative investigation of any allegations of corruption by the ex-President and his ministers. Constituting a Task Force in the lines of the 2002 one is misplaced, and at most will merely serve to undermine the confidence of the country's law enforcement agencies in undertaking their work diligently and professionally.

Private interests and private individuals should be kept at bay, else as a country we are merely manifesting a bankruptcy of governmental reason!

Thinking about Berlusconi

2011-10-20T20:09:00.000-07:00

I think I have always known that Berlusconi is a political reality that is envied. Yesterday, I stood on the pedestal of reason and watched how those that believe only the media can raise their standing in society kowtow before another's self-interests. They thought theirs and his were one footpath, but alas how blind they are. Today, from the pedestal of reason I see a Berlusconi rearing its head in preparedness for the ultimate reach. Many have already taken up strategic positions, and this many, only those that think can decipher it is all part of the script written by Berlusconi. Come tomorrow, please do not say I never warned you

A tragedy of governance reason

2011-10-02T03:07:00.000-07:00

A look at President Michael C. Sata's top ministerial appointments, when compared to the last Cabinet is foreboding.

Ministry of Defence - Geoffrey B. Mwamba [Kalombo Mwansa]; Ministry of Finance - Alexander Chikwanda [Situmbeko Musokotwane]; Ministry of Home Affairs - Kennedy Sakeni [Mkhondo Lungu]; Ministry of Foreign Affairs - Chishimba Kambwili [Kabinga Pande]. I have no apologies to make, but the names in the parenthesis showed the Zambia my forefathers fought for. And that is a Zambia without ethical and regional hegemony in key areas of the governance of my country.

As a people, let us not bury our heads in the sand, and pretend the egression of ethnic and regional hegemony does not bemock the very essence our forefathers fought the Colonialists. That we have a vice-president of occidental descent is laudable, but that ethnic and regional representation is wanting, is a parody of a people's expectations. A tragedy of governance reason.

(first posted on FB wall on Saturday, October 1, 2011 at 01:48hours)

Not in our time, not on our watch

2011-09-28T07:03:00.001-07:00

I hope Zambians are alert to the fact that private individuals that had usurped State power for private gain during the Mwanawasa era are now raising their tails pointedly high. "We have them in our palms," is the catch phrase some are now throwing around. Is this the change the people sought? The answer is a categorical no. We know as fact that some of them owe large amounts of monies; that illegal State institutions they once worked for have audit queries that we may now not have answers to; and, that some private financial institutions became public fiscal guardians merely to serve their interests. Unfortunately, this time there may not be CSOs organisations to protect the interests of the people as many are still drunk with unreasoned euphoria (from an CSO point of view). Please let us stand up, and say no. Not in our time, not on our watch. If private interests are allowed to be embedded in Michael C. Sata's presidency, then the aspirations of the people will inarguably be relegated to the ashes of history.

Whose change is it?

2011-09-22T17:37:00.000-07:00

Today, September 23, 2011 marks another milestone in the history of Zambia. An incumbent president has been unseated, and 20 years of a ruling party has come to an end. Inarguably, the incoming party, PF, is a semblance of the outgoing party as its founder and members are products of the MMD. But that is not, the subject of this blog.

The blog is about the change, I consistently heard being talked about. The lumpen proletariat, the youth, women and the poor, and indeed elements of the middle and upper class all talked about the need for change. But the question we should be asking amidst the euphoria is, whose change is it.

We must not delude ourselves in believing that the need for change is universal or is irrespective of class. Thus, I hope that the change we are about to witness is one that will result in the interests of the lumpen proletariat, youth, women, and the poor reigning supreme over the private interests that may want to usurp State power for private gain. We have witnessed the desperation of the private interests of the middle and upper class. It is imperative that the lower class maintains its expectations of change by keeping the private interests at bay.

For, I am certain it is not private interests that, lumpen proletariat, the youths, women and the poor voted for. The change they desire is a better life than the one they have had. A dignified life. But they too should exercise caution, as the dream can fade quickly, when the private interest pretends to have the same interest.

The upper class may talk the language of the lumpen proletariat, youth, women, and the poor, but they will never know the footpaths these groups walk, for theirs has always been a world apart. History, has never had individuals that live in walled mansions or drive luxury cars have their agendas commensurate with the poor or oppressed. So I sincerely hope, that as the youth, women and the poor celebrate they realise that those that often portend to walk with them, do not necessarily do so. It is their change, and their voice should not just end at disturbing my sleep. They should now strive to make democratic governance accountable.

Change is not limbus factuorum.

Laus Deo

Waiting for William Banda

2011-08-27T11:08:00.000-07:00

Today, August 27, 2011, ZNBC TV news showed some news items worthy comment.

The first, was the coverage of the President of Zambia, Rupiah Banda, at a traditional ceremony in Katete, and his vice, George Kunda, at a Church function in Mkushi. It was interesting to note that in both cases, the two did not use the occasions to campaign for themselves and indeed their party. Instead, they approximated the objectivity we so seek to observe when politicians are at forums that are non-partisan. In stating the foregoing, I know that MMD sycophants would overtly extol this objectivity. But I here hasten to argue that it is not just enough for the Presidency to recognise the difference between a political space and a non-political space. They should manifest this understanding to senior public officials. The Presidency should endeavour to implore senior public officials to discern the difference in a political governmental space and a non-political governmental space. Public officials operate in a non-political government space. To which end, at no point in time, should the citizenry be subjected to public officials having the phrases "MMD government or Rupiah Banda's leadership" in their vocabulary, publicly. (They can do that in the confines of their private spaces). Their's should simply be a vocabulary of "the government", and us the citizenry will of course know which government is being talked about.

Second, and inarguably the most critical, presently, was the news items on the need for non-violence behaviours as we head towards the September 20 General Elections. Moses Muteteka (MMD) and, Guy Scott and Given Lubinda (PF) publicly denounced violence and called on their respective cadres to refrain from violent behaviours. Moses went further to state that he will personally escort MMD cadres arrested for violence to prison, and that he will not visit them once in prison. Profoundly, Moses, Guy and Given all called for the police to carry out their law and order mandate professionally and in a non-partisan manner.

In addition, Guy asked the PF membership to always seek police intervention when threatened by other political party cadres. That an opposition party (PF) can ask its membership to always seek police intervention when threatened can be argued to evidence a recognition of the constitutional authority of the police in Zambia. The onus is now on the police to show the citizenry that indeed they have the constitutional authority to be non-partisan.

BUT, despite these welcome developments, there is William Banda, of the MMD in Lusaka. William is on record criticising violence and advocating violent retaliation in the same sentence". How he managed that, is a feat I am still trying to unravel.

William needs, to also, take to a public podium and denounce violence in categorical terms and not proclamations with claw-backs.

Mr William Banda, sir, we are waiting!

A Long Road to Limbo?

2011-08-21T07:23:00.001-07:00

Fencing the 20 years of Zambia’s democracy

Nearly 20 years ago on October 31 1991, Zambia emerged from a one-party State into a multi-party democratic State. Looking back, there is really nothing much to celebrate as the aspirations of the era to have come are yet to be realised.

Today, in my mind it seems much like all we did was increase the number of empty cans beating the same cacophony of “self-governance, democracy, at last”, and indeed the empty can drummers. The noise has got louder. The number of self-appointed connoisseurs of democratic knowledge and protectors of good governance has multiplied. And tragically, such connoisseurs have become a law onto themselves or simply continually engage in a repertoire of manoeuvres aimed at enriching themselves and or enhancing their socio-political standing in an information-deficient population under the pretext of being voices for the voiceless.

In all this, the fundaments of what we aspired for in 1991 have got so murky that it is clear our democratic experience is failing. There is no doubt in my mind that the period before September 20 should have been a time of serious objective introspection and better perspectives on the years to come. But, I know many only remember the worthless debate on 50 plus 1, which in my mind epitomised our traditional reverence of leaders! A president has to have political legitimacy, was the sour singsong, as if in a democracy only the legitimacy of a president matters. Sic. In any case, many self-appointed connoisseurs of democratic knowledge and protectors of good governance did not even read the Constitution of Zambia draft!

And of course, many will also remember the “private individuals” task force on corruption, that many did not realise was merely an unfortunate usurpation of State agencies’ powers by some individuals that deemed (and still do) themselves the perfect connoisseurs of anti-corruption. They will not even remember the lies that led to Mukelabai Mukelabai, an eminent public prosecutor, being hounded out of office.

Let us remind ourselves and acknowledge that the failure of democratic regimes in emergent democracies, like Zambia, has often been because of the rushed regimentation of western democratic ideals and economic paradigms on populations whose prevailing socio-economic and political context provides a perversion of the ideals and sustains an elite ruling class that preys on the populations’ economic malaise. This is not however, like I have consistently stated, to argue that democratic ideals and western economic paradigms are a failing in their entirety, but to affirm that any adoption or regimentation of any ideals and their subsequent sustenance has preconditions.

In Zambia’s context, such preconditions should have been a parallel process of streamlining State institutions tasked with State regulation (like the judiciary, parliament, the electoral commission) as a means of providing safeguards to the likelihood of perversion of the ideals and, more so as a means of securing the citizenry’s enjoyment of rights and freedoms of democratic ideals and practice. In addition, the observed creation of Donor driven parallel structures of public administration and governance (like Central Board of Health, RDA, et cetera), should have had a parallel reform of existing Public administration structures. E.g., we have RDA and we have Department of Roads!

In the nearly twenty years of multiparty democracy, the country has turned to gloom and a questioned hope for the majority of the people of Zambia. There are unstable governance frameworks, dysfunctional institutions, an unsure civil society, and a polarised media. The latter, today, evidences a private media that assumes it is puritanical, and a public media that can not differentiate between a party in Government and a Government. Well, I guess could be the public media do not realise that the one-party State ended 20 years ago, and so did the concept of the PIG! As for the puritanical private media, I will dwell on that later.

In introspecting the country’s democratic experience so far, it is inarguable that intra-party and inter-party political intolerance and lack of inclusiveness is threatening the gains of the democratic dispensation. While Zambia posses all the formal institutions of democracy, these institutions have remained empty shells failing to function effectively and provide the necessary checks and balances, mostly because the perversion of power is our fixated mental state.

Our fixation on perversion of power is so manifest even in our own small spaces of influences, to the extent that we are always quick to blame political leaders for our own failures and cowardice. We fear, even where there is no reason to. And we fear because we are not sure we are where we are because we deserve it!

The most salient failing in our democratic experience is the critical misunderstanding of democratic representation. There is a serious misnomer in this country that our political representatives, in particular members of parliament, are the epitome of knowledge on what we seek our country to be. It is this fallacy that led me to write somewhere; I do not remember where, that “In Africa, democracy often ends where it starts. The polling booth”. That, periodic elections in this country have failed to provide means of vertical and horizontal accountability that should prevent the abuse of power and misuse of authority, is mostly because of our fixated mental state on perversion of power, and indeed our failure to reason on democratic representation.

For instance, that members of parliament are representatives of different interest groups in a society is evidently an alien understanding for the majority of Zambians. Most Zambians, educated or not educated, hold the belief that MPs should solely initiate governance reform (development, legal and otherwise) without the interest groups lobbying for such reforms. What we forget, is that our MPs have no qualms sitting idle in parliament for five years doing nothing. After all, they are a power onto themselves that we have allowed.

In our nearly 20 years of democratic experience, we are misgoverned mostly because we do not know our relationships to people that represent us. The onus is not entirely on MPs to consult (why should they, when they are cosy!). It is the citizenry that should demand a return on their group interests as an exchange for choosing them as their representatives.

September 20, offers us an opportunity to walk a different road, a road away from a road to limbo. We have had opportunities to define a new road, but we have always been allowing narrow self-servicing interests to dictate the national agenda. And one opportunity, which I have consistently argued could have defined a road away from limbo, is the Constitution Bill. It is my firm belief that the 50 plus 1 “empty can rantings” were merely a paternalistic sophistry that hoodwinked most Zambians to the detriment of well intentioned Constitutional provisions, and indeed those that could have been suggested. The argument that 50 plus 1 safeguards a president’s political legitimacy is otiose. One of democracy’s principle tenets is equity in representation, and not mere majoritarianism, which 50 plus 1 is founded on. I argue, here, that today majoritarianism is the antithesis of democratic representation, and one of the major reasons of the failure of democracy in most emergent democracies.

Let us not forget that the most manifest dark side of democracy is legitimised mediocrity, through unreasoned adherence to majoritarianism. I say this, because I firmly believe majoritarianism is not a representative paradigm that takes into account human population diversity in space. In short, the legitimacy of a president is not about the number of people that voted for him or her, but the number of diverse human populations spaces that voted for him or her. That is, the proportions of diverse spaces should be what provide political legitimacy! Noteworthy is that, equity in representation is a democratic tenet that is also absent within our political parties.

Amidst all the political euphoria characterising our democracy at the ballot only, expected sustained parliamentary lobbies for social justice and good laws are yet to be a daily occurrence in this country. I seriously do not remember the last time, I saw an interest group lobbying at parliament in this country! Madam Lucy Sichone was the last person, I can remember doing so. Any way, she was the perfect epitome of civil society activism that the country has ever had. (Me, I use words of pen).

In retrospect, there is no doubt in my mind, that if as a people we do not have a mental shift in our perception of democratic representation, come September 20, the democratic experience of the last 20 years will simply be a long road to limbo!

My Father & the Picture on My Wall

2011-08-03T00:52:00.000-07:00

We all always have jaded memories of our parents. But in our revering our parents, we all always create such utopian parents that if they were still alive they would look like angelic fairies always holdings our hands and leading us to greener green gardens under which rivers always flow. My jaded memory of my parents only always comes into vivid focus when I reflect on their solemn moments, happy and sad times, and mostly the questions they always deferred to “when you are older I will tell you”. My father was the most ardent at giving this response, to the extent that it always became a chorus we sang for him whenever he scratched his heard before responding.

Mum is a memory of this pretty patrician black woman in whose bosom we would find warmth, and to whose skirts we would hold on to dear life when the man she called darling wanted to give us a serious spanking. It often did not take much to upset her darling. A simple omission like not watering the garden or even lazing in his favoured sofa, would invoke in him the sense that the wrath of his leather belt should descend on us. But, there was always mum’s skirt to intercede.

A vivid memory of mum are the times this sweet woman we loved so much would abandon us to go and work at a women’s group in the community distant from our middle class environment. Well, there were no upper class areas then. It was either you lived kumayadi, the low density green residential areas, or the compound, the high density not so green residential areas.

From our infantile rationalisations, it was not fair at all that mum would leave us to go and work in the compounds! But of course, in our minds, there were also the times this sweet woman turned into a hideous creature. Then, my father would be our darling too. These were mostly the times, she would holler so loud that our eye drums would nearly burst. All because we were still playing hide and seek or kicking the hide off a soccer ball way after dusk. She would round us up, march us into the bathtub, and give us a scrubbing that in our little minds felt like we would leave the bathtub without our skin. Our new darling would then come to soothe us with the chocolate sweets we had hoped he would give us when he knocked off from work.

Ah! In my mind it is clear how at other times the “chocolate sweet” saga unfolded. Sometimes after getting tired of kicking the hide off the soccer ball early, we would keep sentry on the plush porch, looking out for my father. We did not have prison-like wall fences then. A sighting would see us rush to the gate to greet my father, walk with him a bit hoping he will give us chocolate sweets. We always believed, we could smell them on him. When the sweets were not forthcoming, we would run into the house and crowd around his favourite sofa. The sofa always had a clandestine thing about it. And yet, when he walked in, his first destination was the kitchen.

We would sulk, walk out, and in the local language, say, "gosh that woman is a spoiler. Now she will ask if we have already bathed”. And my father would retort, "I don’t allow that criminal language in my house". Those were the days!

My father was a stern man, who seldom smiled, but liked the sound of his voice. His worst moments were when politicians came to visit our town. His position in the office always meant that he had to attend without fail, else the wrath of the Party would fall on him. And he would bulldoze us to accompany him. Did we glow, looking up at my father up on the podium, next to all those big Party comrades! Yet, he did not smile. If anything his face got sterner and contorted as if angry. It always got worse, when the political creatures from the Capital started eulogising nothingness for development. No different from the incident when one day my father came home seething, neck bursting to the seams.

“Woman,” he shouted at mum. “Some Party chairman and his cadres rudely walk into my office without knocking, to simply come and tell me that he has a report that I do not respect the President. Why? Because the President’s picture hangs behind my seat. What nonsense.” And he walked out ranting. The next we saw him was deep in the night, smelling like a brewery. The next day, he apologised to mum, and gave us a lecture on cretins pretending to work for the people. Why can’t they learn from Jesus, he surmised. Who exactly is this guy he always talks about, we would always ask ourselves. Whoever Jesus was, he seemed to be fixated in my father’s life.

That brings me to the few instances, my father smiled. The most vivid instances that seemed to light my father’s face like an angel were when in the presence of mum, and when in a huge building with frosted crystal-like glass and a huge cross on top. The huge building with frosted crystal-like glass and a huge cross on top is one building we dreaded. We associated it with early Sunday morning serious scrubbing from mum.

On Sundays, we would be frog matched proudly, in our Sunday best, to this monstrous building, inside was his favourite guy on the Cross. And when, the Hail Marias and Pater nosters started, my father would beam like a full moon on a dark night and hail along. The guy on the Cross always struck a weak cord in us. Despite looking eerily solemn and melancholic, it was always like he was calling out to us or even reading our thoughts at the time. He really made us very uncomfortable. We would look around agitated, wishing we were kicking the hide off the soccer ball, and not having some guy on the Cross interrogating our inner fears. We could never wait to bolt from the place.

On the way back home, we would ask my father who the solemn looking person on the Cross was. “Jesus, and he loves you”, he would reply, lovingly patting our heads. “But why is he on the Cross”, my elder brother would ask. “He is the son of God, and he was crucified. He loves us so much that he decided to die for our sins”.

“Who is God?”
“Papa, what is sin?”
“And what kind of guy would want to die for all of us?”
“Come on papa, how can someone love people he does not know?”

The questions would rain on him like rain falls during a thunderstorm. In his usual manner, my father would resort to the best answer he seemed to always have.

“When you are older I will tell you”. As we entered the teens, my father tried to explain, but it all always seemed like a fairy tale. God, Jesus, mother Mary seemed so distant to our reality as children. If anything, Church was just a building where, every Sunday, adults like my father dragged children to against their will.

Many years later, in my adulthood, my father, then retired, came visiting. I had just moved into my flat. It was still scantily furnished. In the living room, there were only two stringy straw chairs, two three-legged traditional stools, a heavily tobacco stained coffee table, a poorly stocked bookshelf, and a television set on the floor. On the wall behind the television set, hang a picture of an iconic person whose story I held in awe. I even had several books on him. In the few times I sat pretending to watch TV, I think I spent more time looking at the picture than watching TV.
It is an inspirational picture, this picture on my wall.
The distance he stares at. The dreams of freedom he longed for peoples of all creed.
This picture on my blank wall is a melancholic palimpsest of the road I walk. I see so much pain, I see so much sadness. If only.

My father sat in one of the stringy straw chairs, beaming like he was sitting in a King’s throne. Little did he know that I was worried sick that he might want to spend the night. The flat was gravely Spartan that the beds were simply cheap single mattresses on the floor, and it was only two bedroomed. My sister was staying with me at the time.

From the stool, I cringed and watched him. He, strangely, did not talk much. He just sat straight-backed, pensively looking at the picture above the TV set. Later, he continued looking at the picture as he ate his super.

When it dawned on me that he was indeed spending the night, I offered him my room. It was going to be a rough night, as I would have to sleep on the floor.

“And where are you going to sleep?” He asked.
“Don’t worry dad, I will manage,” was my sheepish reply.
“Hey I am lean. I won’t take much space in your bed,” he simply replied, laughing. “You do not need to be ashamed that you think you do not have enough to share. I say this because you do, but in your heart you deny it.” He added.

Indeed that night my father and I spent the night on the single mattress on the floor! And he slept so peacefully that I did not even feel he was in my bed. I spent most of the night thinking I need to do something about my Spartan existence.

When I woke up, my father was already in the living room.

“There are people who are much worse off than you, my son,” my father simply said, immediately I walked into the living room. He, then again, pensively locked his eyes on the picture above the TV set.

“Who is he?” He asked.
“Ernesto Che Guevara,” I proudly replied. My father did not know Che!
“Why is he on your wall?” I explained.
“And he left his well-off life to fight for others?”
“Indeed.”
“Then I know him, too.”
“You do?” My father did not answer. He paused and asked another question instead.

“How can someone love people he does not know?” My father suddenly asked. The ground below me seemed to give in. I looked away, remembering a time when I had asked the very same question.

“He may not be Jesus, but at least from what you have told me, his ways could be admirable. Humane, but he can not be Jesus,” my father solemnly said.

Later in the day, he bid us farewell, and his departing words till today always hang around my deepest thoughts.

“Are your ways like the man on your wall,” he had asked. “As humans, do we really care for those we do not know? He had added.

My father, always an enigma, a solemn reminder of our deepest fears. We are always afraid to care beyond those we know, beyond those we love. And yet we claim to know God.

The guy on the Cross in the building of my childhood Sundays is a testament of what our existence should be. A greater love beyond our inner fears that we should know we can be able to love beyond those we know. That tomorrow we should look back and say: “Those are my footprints, and many that could not walk with me, that fell besides me, and those that came after me found the footprints to be the light that shone an existence of hope for them”.

That if, tomorrow my father walked with me again, I would proudly say: “I now know love.”

And I write this today, because looking back I now know my father and the picture on my wall revealed a truism by which we should all live. That is, my father is an anachronism, whose meaning is only deciphered today. And, Jesus the son of God that was fixated in my father’s life is a testimony whose meaning lives beyond time, and indeed beyond our religious affiliations, for love has no religious hegemony.

THE BAROTSE QUESTION - ASHES OF HISTORY?

2011-03-02T11:51:00.000-08:00

A paper presentation to the CPD National Conference
on Traditional Authorities, Decentralisation and Rural Development
Lusaka, Zambia
February 28 – 1 March 1, 2011

“It must always be understood that humans are an inconsistent phenomenon.
They exhibit unreasoning behaviours with or without socio-cultural structure and norms, but tending to exhibit more unreasoning behaviours when there is a breakdown in the socio-cultural structures and norms.”

1.0 INTRODUCTION
Gerald Caplan in his book “Elites of Barotseland” observes that “Barotseland had existed as an independent national entity long before the creation of Northern Rhodesia, and was legally and historically entitled to maintain or dissolve the attachment as its people wished”. The underlying assumption inherent in this assertion is that Barotseland self-rule is an inviolable entitlement that the people of Barotseland have held over time. The continuance of this entitlement before the independence of the then Northern Rhodesia, and amalgamation of Barotseland into the State of Zambia, is evidenced in the Barotseland Agreement of May 18, 1964.

However, the Barotse Question or the restoration of the Barotseland Agreement, today, merits interrogation as to the validity of the nature of influences that determine when the Barotse “people’s wishes” necessitate assertion of self-rule as presumed to be promulgated in the Agreement. Dissent to a sense of belonging to a State has myriad reasons. Dominant of them however are sustenance of a sense of belonging to a historically and colonially recognised traditionally defined nationhood; and a sense of socio-economic and political exclusion (or marginalisation) in the post-colonial State, which in Africa is sometimes simply an assemblage of ethnic groups that were defined as a nation by the colonial masters.

Arguably, a dichotomous citizenry has always emerged in post-colonial States in Africa. On one hand, is the citizenry whose sense of belonging to the new State is subsumed more by their allegiance to the traditionally defined nationhood or authority; and on the other, are the citizenry whose sense of belonging to the new State is subsumed more by a sense of socio-economic and political inclusion. In Zambia, the former are mostly the rural populations who live in areas where traditional authority is still the dominant governance authority with respect to livelihood entitlements. And, the latter are the urban populations who live in areas where statutory authority defining the State is dominant.

Undoubtedly, in a democracy like Zambia there is supposition that both ends of the citizenry dichotomy have controlling influence on the decisions and affairs of government, and that there will be equitable and equal socio-economic development. To which end, dissent to a sense of belonging to a State premised on a sense of socio-economic and political exclusion (or marginalisation) should not arise. Yet, in the Barotse Question it has!

Thus, this paper in re-examining the argument for the restoration of the Barotseland Agreement, seeks to provide a dialectical framework for interrogating emergent and or post- colonial States’ democratic governance representation within a dichotomous citizenry. The paper, further, endeavours to provide a framework for a desirable political governance mode likely to mitigate influences that can likely determine when a “people’s wishes” necessitate assertion of self-rule or secession.

The succeeding section of this paper provides a brief historic chronology on the Barotseland quest for self-rule, and then the salient features of the Barotseland Agreement. The third section interrogates the re-emergence of the Barotse Question within the assumption of a sense of socio-economic and political exclusion (or marginalisation), based on a poverty-State Governance representation comparative assay. The fourth section discusses the quest for the restoration of the Barotseland Agreement of 1964 by interrogating whether it is merely a quest for self-rule, preservation of a monarchy or federalism. This is attempted by considering the underlying political governance paradigms of the terms of the Agreement. The fifth section questions whether the Barotse Question provides governance re-think or it is merely ashes of history, and presents the likely opportunities and lessons of the Barotseland Agreement for the country’s governance re-think. The last section is the conclusion.

2.0 THE QUEST FOR SELF-RULE AND THE BAROTSELAND AGREEMENT
In discussing the Barotse Question due recognition should be made of the fact that in pre-colonial times only a few of Zambia’s ethnic groups had politically centralised chieftainships with developed bureaucracies (Roberts 1976). The Lozi Kingdom or what is referred to as Barotseland can be argued to have been the most politically centralised and socio-culturally coherent, and thus that its people have always had a sense of Lozi national consciousness.

The Lozi Kingdom evolved out of a citizen and subject paradigm, where the Aluyi or Luyanas subdued or coerced other groups in most of Western Zambia , and created extensive spheres of influence and also often posted consuls to other neighbouring ethnic groups. The governance modes among the subdued and or coerced groups were based on the political institutional structures of the central authority of the Litunga. Governance inclusiveness, was however, practiced as all subjects had representation in spiritual, military and judicial roles, although supremacy of aristocratic heredity reigned.

A notable manifestation of Lozi national consciousness is June 27 1890, when King Lewanika I and the British South Africa Company signed the Frank Lochner Treaty , which made Barotseland a British protectorate. The Lochner Treaty to a considerable extent diminished Lozi autonomy.

And probably, this lose of autonomy could be the genesis of the quest for self-rule that has been evidenced overtime with first the British South Africa Company (BSAC), then the British colonial administration, and subsequent post-colonial governments of Zambia.

For instance in 1907 , King Lewanika requested the British Government that Barotseland protectorate be removed from North Western Rhodesia and company rule and be given the same status as Bechuanaland (Botswana). This request was denied by Lord Selborne, the British High Commissioner in Cape Town.

The most profound quest for self-rule was in 1921, when King Yeta III presented Prince Arthur of Connaught, the new High Commissioner, a petition that, in the main, demanded direct rule of the Imperial Government as a protected native state over the entire territory known as Barotseland North-Western Rhodesia; that all concessions granted to and agreements concluded with the BSAC be cancelled; and that, the Barotse reserve be extended to include two further areas, that is Caprivi Strip and the land from the headwaters of the Dongwe river down to where the Anglo-Portuguese boundary cuts the Zambezi river .

In 1932, the Barotse Royal Establishment held discussions with the Governor at the Colonial Office on the quest for Barotseland being a separate Native State. The discussions, again, did not yield the desired quest for self-rule. The subsequent years evidenced a plethora of demands and discussions for self-rule and restoration of the boundaries of Barotseland . Thus, in June 1948, the Barotse National Council demanded that there should be self-governing status for the Barotseland protectorate.

A phantasma of self-rule was attained in 1953, when Barotseland was declared a ‘protectorate within the protectorate’, during the processes of the federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland. In addition, Barotseland’s sovereignty was recognised in section 112 of the Constitution of Northern Rhodesia. This section asserted Barotseland’s protection against alienation of any part of the territory except with the consent of the Litunga and his council. In this respect, it is often argued that King Sir Mwanawina III accepted the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland as the constitutional provisions enhanced Barotseland’s quest for self-rule.

In 1957, the Barotse Native Government through its National Council resolved that Barotseland should secede from the Federation and remain under the protection of Her Majesty’s Government in line with the 1900 Agreement should the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland be allowed to proceed to independence .

In the following year, 1960, a demand for secession from Northern Rhodesia and the Federation was instituted by the Barotse National Council, with an attendant demand that there should be a proclamation that Barotseland protectorate should be directly under the British government. To which end, it is imputed that Ngambela Imasiku said the following:

“We do not consider ourselves a part of Northern Rhodesia or as a protectorate within a protectorate. We are a different country and a different people. We have our own government.”

Thus, in 1961 Barotseland secession demands submitted to the Colonial Secretary and to the Northern Rhodesia Government mostly affirmed Barotseland’s right to self-rule and independence, and consequently that they should no longer be control of Barotseland by the Northern Rhodesia Government.

Noteworthy, is that protestations for Barotseland self-rule continued up to Zambia’s independence and even after the promulgation of the Barotseland Agreement of 1964, as the post-colonial government of Zambia in its nation-State building process enacted and made proclamations that likely abrogated the obligations and rights contained in treaties and concessions between the British government and Barotseland protectorate.

The Barotseland Agreement of May, 1964 between “Kenneth David Kaunda, Prime Minister of Northern Rhodesia of the one part and Sir Mwanawina Lewanika the Third, K.B.E., Litunga of Barotseland, acting on behalf of himself, his heirs and successors, his council, and the chiefs and people of Barotseland of the other party is signed by the Right Honourable Duncan Sandys, M.P Her Majesty's principal secretary of state for common wealth relations and for the colonies, to signify the approval of her majesty's government in the united kingdom of the arrangements entered into between the parties to this agreement” provided the governance and legitimacy framework for the creation of the independent sovereign State of Zambia.

The salient features of the Agreement are a definition of the terms under which the Litunga of Barotseland assented to Barotseland protectorate’s amalgamation with Northern Rhodesia protectorate to create the new nation-State called Zambia.

Dominant of which are the continued protection and respect by the government of Zambia of the obligations and rights contained in treaties and concessions between the British government and Barotseland, and that the “customary law of Barotseland shall be the principal local authority for the government and administration of Barotseland” , and that the Litunga of Barotseland, acting after consultation with his Council, shall be authorised and empowered to make laws for Barotseland in relation to the matters that include the Litungaship; the Barotse Government; local government land; forests; traditional and customary matters relating to Barotseland alone; the institution at present known as the Barotse native treasury; and local taxation.

In retrospect, the Barotseland Agreement of 1964 is inarguably an inherent quest for Barotseland self-rule premised on chiefly the sense of belonging to a historically and colonially recognised traditionally defined nationhood, and the consequent sense of Lozi national consciousness.

3.0 BAROTSELAND, POVERTY AND GOVERNANCE REPRESENTATION
Notwithstanding the foregoing arguments on the Barotse Question rationalised by the sense of Lozi national consciousness, the re-emergence of the Barotse Question, however, is seemingly premised on the assumption of a sense of socio-economic and political exclusion (or marginalisation). This assumption is based on the observation that most pronouncements, proclamations, and reasons for dissent, today, direct one's attention to the evident poverty and underdevelopment in Western province or Barotseland.

That Western province is the poorest and least developed province in Zambia, is not a subject of debate. But, it should also be acknowledged that all rural Zambia has comparatively been neglected for sometime in our country’s development history, is also not a subject of debate.

What is debatable and what citizen’s should question given today’s worrisome polarity of our political space is the legitimacy of criticisms of the causes of poverty and underdevelopment in rural parts of our country. Rural underdevelopment in Zambia is not a partisan question.

The objective facts of poverty in Zambia, for instance in the period 1991 to 2006, show that the incidence of poverty is characteristic of all rural provinces, as evident in Table 1.0 below.

Table 1.0 Incidence of Poverty by Province, 1991 - 2006
[NOTE:DOWNLOAD PDF VERSION AT http://kasisichildren.org/Barotse.pdf to view Tables and Figures in this paper]
(Source CSO, Living Conditions Monitoring Survey, 1991, 1993, 1996, 1998, 2004 and 2006)

It is inarguable from Table 1.0, that Western province has over time had the worst levels of poverty, but so do other rural provinces in the country. This trend is similar even when indices like employment levels, literacy, or nutritional status considered, as for instance the case in Figure 1.0 on nutritional status of children.
[NOTE:DOWNLOAD PDF VERSION AT http://kasisichildren.org/Barotse.pdf to view Tables and Figures in this paper]

It is clear that these statistics show a rural-urban dichotomy relative to the social-economic status the country’s population. In short, rural Zambia has always been short-changed!

The question then is why is this so, if we hold valid the assumption that “access to positions of political and administrative power is important for competing social groups in that it provides them with visible recognition, a ‘say’ in decision making and control over government resources” .

In this respect, can it be assumed that rural populations are underrepresented in our democratic governance representative framework? Or can it be assumed that inequities in governance representation at the national level have produced inequalities at the regional levels?

On the contrary, Lindemann’s (2010) governance representative indices by regional groupings and or ethnic groupings in periods of the years 1964 to 2008 do not show significant ethnic marginalisation, though variances are observable. Figures 2.0, 3.0, 4.0, and 5.0 provide an illustration of the foregoing.
[NOTE:DOWNLOAD PDF VERSION AT http://kasisichildren.org/Barotse.pdf to view Tables and Figures in this paper]

The succeeding, Table 2.0, Figures 6.0 and 7.0 show political power sharing as indicative of the composition of the civil service, measured by the inter-group distribution of permanent secretary positions.

[NOTE:DOWNLOAD PDF VERSION AT http://kasisichildren.org/Barotse.pdf to view Tables and Figures in this paper]

Inarguably the foregoing illustrations show that governance representation in Zambia has been void of inequities likely to cause ethnic dissent in the dominant ethnic groups. And that admittedly, this has been a result of Kenneth Kaunda’s policy of ‘tribal balancing’, and its continuance, though, with varying degrees during subsequent presidencies.

The objective facts of this representativeness is a trend that is not commensurate with the obtaining poverty levels in rural Zambia, as most ethnical groups have had relatively equitable representativeness, and yet the evident results of this equitable representativeness is abject poverty for most of the populations in rural Zambia.

Therefore, it can be argued that in Zambia, horizontal equality at the ‘elite level’ has produced horizontal inequalities at the mass level. To which end, the assumption that “leaders with access to positions of state power will tend to redistribute to their ‘own’ social groups” , as the mainstream argue on the case of poverty in Western province is sophism.

In addition, that the re-emergence of the Barotse Question can be attributable to a sense of socio-economic and political exclusion (or marginalisation), is merely a travesty of reason or grave sophism. The Barotse Question can arguably be more rationalised by the sense of belonging to a historically and colonially recognised traditionally defined nationhood, and the consequent Lozi national consciousness.

Admittedly, and not withstanding the foregoing, the Barotse Question has over the years been used as a tool for a more representative national governance mode. Thus, a see-saw semblance of Barotse sentiments is evident whenever Lozis feel marginalised.

For instance, Sichone and Simutanyi (1996) observe that when Lozi political leaders were marginalised in the Movement for Multiparty Democracy (MMD) and the subsequent composition of government during Frederick Jacob Titus Chiluba ascension to power, there was a re-emergence of demands for the restoration of regional autonomy under the Barotseland Agreement, in addition to the creation of a Lozi-based political party .

4.0 A QUEST FOR SELF-RULE, PRESERVATION OF A MONARCHY, OR FEDERALISM
However, the Barotseland Agreement when dialectically interrogated manifests a superfluity of governance paradigms. The paradigms are either a quest for self-rule, preservation of a monarchy, or federalism .

The quest for self-rule is manifest in the affirmation of asserting protection and respect by the government of Zambia of the obligations and rights contained in treaties and concessions between the British government and Barotseland protectorate, which duly recognised that Barotseland was an autonomous colonised nation within another colonised nation.

Further, the Agreement’s affirmation that the “customary law of Barotseland shall be the principal local authority for the government and administration of Barotseland”, and that the Litunga of Barotseland, acting after consultation with his Council, shall be authorised and empowered to make laws for Barotseland, evidences recognition of a monarchic form of governance as kingship is duly asserted. Due recognition should however be made that Barotseland had over time developed an inclusive form of traditional governance, despite royal heredity being supreme to the subjects .

But, notable is that, the Agreement also provides the government of Zambia sovereignty over Barotseland on the administration of justice ; the public service ; fiscal responsibility, administration and economic development of Barotseland ; and leasehold land administration .
Inarguably, the recognition of Barotseland quasi-sovereignty as manifest in the Agreement’s recognition of self-rule and a preservation of a monarchic governance system, and the delegation of powers to the central government over certain matters in Barotseland, provides a dichotomy of governance. Thus, the superfluity of governance paradigms from the Barotseland Agreement can be inferred to be twofold: self-rule and a monarchy; and, federalism .

In short, the character of the State of Zambia that should have evolved out of the Barotseland Agreement is a federal state . In this respect, an attempt should be made to understand the quest for self-rule in this context. In any case, for traditionalists, the sense of belonging to a historically and colonially recognised traditionally defined nationhood, and the consequent Lozi national consciousness, dates far beyond the Frank Lochner Treaty of 1890.

5.0 ASHES OF HISTORY OR A GOVERNANCE RE-THINK
The Barotse Question is characteristically a historic cohesive group dissent founded on ethnic nationalist consciousness very much different from other Zambian ethnic groups. The contemporary quest for the restoration of the Barotse Agreement provides a governance rethink. It is a framework for interrogation of governance modes of self-rule existing within a federal state.

However, it should be acknowledged that the Barotse Question’s perseverance is sustained by the dichotomous nature of political governance in Zambia, which is rooted in the country’s State-building process. The country’s political governance has evolved from a pendulum of polarity between traditionalists and nation-State building advocates or what have been termed nationalists.

There always have been the traditionalists and the nationalists, and this has historically being more pronounced in Western province, than in any other province in Zambia. Whereas the traditionalists sought to preserve their customary and or traditional authority over their subjects within an independent State, the nationalists (mostly urban subjects) favoured the creation of a more cohesive State that recognised boundaries of colonial domination of peoples with similar aspirations, traditions and culture.

Thus, although traditionalists perceived African nationalism as a challenge to their autonomy and privilege (Sichone and Simutanyi, 1996) , the resulting democratic governance modes in post-independent Zambia though recognising the polarity, created a dichotomous governance system that usurped most of the traditionalists autonomy and privilege. Consequently, the resulting political governance has been one of political and public service elitism, which has not served the socio-economic interests of most of the populations in rural Zambia that still live under traditional modes of governance.

An assumption made about Zambia’s contemporary political governance is that it necessitates that the people have controlling influence on the decisions and affairs of government; and that, the people are supreme to government” . However, it is clear that this chosen polity has not allowed citizenry controlling influence on the decisions and affairs of government despite near equitable representation in governance, as it does not reconcile the country’s governance dichotomy.

In this respect, the Barotse Question is not ashes of history, nor is it an inane emotional attachment to historical romanticism. Its re-emergence, can in part, be attributable to the usurpation of the traditionalists autonomy and privilege during the country’s State-building process.

The governance re-think premised on the opportunities the Barotseland Agreement provides, here makes the assumption that:
(a) The country’s political and public service elites have not substantively equitably determined development entitlements; and that,
(b) There is no elite bargaining based on social group or regional representation.

The Barotse Question lends credence to the fact that historical events shape inter-regional relations within a centralised State. Thus, this paper argues that the Barotse Question provides the State of Zambia the opportunity for a non-dichotomous governance system, which can integrate traditional and customary governance frameworks under which the majority of the rural populations exist.

A governance re-think premised on the Barotse Question is simply an affirmation of the need for equitably determined development entitlements, and elite bargaining based on social group or regional representation. After all, every region has its own history, traditions and culture, in addition to peculiar political, social and economic problems.

Thus, the Barotse Question’s derived governance paradigm is one of inclusive models of political governance structures of devolution of power, as a means of allowing for more regional representative structures of government. This is in recognition of the argument that the Barotse Question also provides a framework for reconciling the historic divide between political elites and traditionalists.

And the derivative political governance paradigm from the Barotse Question is federalism with its consequent self-rule for the regions .

Federalism is a reconciliatory political governance structure that recognises historic, traditional and cultural diversity. It is a governance paradigm that can provide government space for statutory institutionalisation of traditional and customary authority, which is inarguably integral to the Barotse Question.

Notable is that, federalism provides equitable local and central political and administrative representation, which is critical for populations characterised by historic, traditional and cultural diversity.

6.0 CONCLUSION
In retrospect, although this paper argues that the Barotse Question is rationalised by a people’s sense of belonging to a historically affirmed monarchic nation, it has also asserted that the Barotse Question should serve to provide a dialectic framework for interrogating political and public service governance representation within a dichotomous population.

The paper has shown that equities in governance representation at the national level have not produced equalities in socio-economic development at the regional levels. To which end, the paper has argued that economic and political exclusion (or marginalisation) can not be attributed to the contemporary re-emergence of the Barotse Question, but that it is more a product of the country’s dichotomous political governance that does not provide adequate regional political and administrative space to traditionally and culturally diverse social groups.

Thus, the paper has argued that federalism can provide a governance paradigm that can mitigate influences that can likely determine when a “people’s wishes” necessitate assertion of self-rule or secession, as it is a reconciliatory paradigm of the historic divide between political elites and traditionalists.

In conclusion, it is here argued that the Barotse Question should never be reduced to a mere political exercise of gaining political competiveness, as the underlying causes of the re-emergence of dissent on the Barotseland Agreement are historic and, in part, inherent in the contradictions of political governance representation and rural poverty.

The Barotse Question is a product of the rural poverty vis-à-vis political governance representation disconnect evident in Zambia. It is not a parody for political opportunism!

REFERENCES

Caplan,. G. L., (1970), The Elites of Barotseland 1878–1969, C. Hurst & Co London.
Cederman, L., Wimmer, A., and Min, B., (2010), ‘Why do ethnic groups rebel? New data and analysis’, World Politics 62(1): 87-119.
Chandra, K., (2006), ‘What is ethnic identity and does it matter?’ Annual Review of Political Science 9(1): 397-424.
DiJohn, J., and Putzel, J., (2009), ‘Political Settlements’, GSDRC Issues Paper, Birmingham: University of Birmingham, International Development Department.
Gertzel, C., (1984), ‘Western Province: tradition, economic deprivation and political alienation’, in Gertzel, Baylies and Szeftel (eds), The Dynamics of the one-party state in Zambia, Manchester University Press, Manchester.
Hall, R., (1976), Zambia 1890-1964: The Colonial Period, Longman, London.
Lindemann, S., (2010), Inclusive elite bargains and civil war avoidance: The case of Zambia, Crisis States Working Papers Series No.2.
Mbinji, M., (2002), Political Governance in Zambia - A Civil Society Position. Afronet – Consultation Paper prepared for Consultative Group Meeting 2002
Phiri, B. J., (2006), A Political History of Zambia: From the Colonial Period to the 3rd Republic. Africa Research & Publications, Trenton, NJ.
Roberts, A. D., (1976), A History of Zambia, Heinemann, London.
Sichone, O., and Simutanyi, N., (1996), ‘The Ethnic and Regional Questions, Ethnic Nationalism and the State in Zambia: The Case of Barotseland 1964-1994’, in Sichone and Chikulo (eds), Democracy in Zambia: Challenges for the Third Republic, Sapes Books, Harare.

A Travesty of Reason

2011-02-10T04:04:00.001-08:00

An Interrogation of the Barotse Question within Poverty & Nation-State Governance Representation
a press release by Mbinji Mufalo
(Human Rights & Governance Consultant)
Thursday, 10 February 2011

"It is the failed past we fail to correct today, that lead to the failed future we live in the day after today."

I, Mbinji Mufalo, holds this press conference as a concerned citizen. My national identity is Zambian, and my ethnic group heritage is Lozi. The unorthodox opinions I will herein express are solely mine and are based on my long years of human rights, democracy and governance consultancy in the NGO and public sector and study.

Some, I am sure, some asked themselves, who is he and why is he holding a press conference. I always express myself on governance issues in this country and I have been doing so for close to more than two decades now. I do so (have been doing so) mostly in print media that allow me space to express my unorthodox expressions, and in position papers we used to issue years ago. In recent years, my contentions and thoughts on governance issues in my country have been expressed through my personal blog and website (http://mbinjimufalo.blogspot.com and http://miliko.vndv.com, respectively).

But, on the Baroste Question, it became clear to me that my modes of expression do not serve the greater interests of our knowledge and information deficient population. The Internet is a luxury in our context, to which end the people with whom I seek to share my contentions will rarely, if not never, hear my voice. Thus, I conceived this idea of a press conference, as you the media are a broader knowledge and information communication instrument.

In my opening remarks, I must first say the loss of life by individuals asserting their right to dissent is unfortunate and unacceptable. And that individuals are incarcerated for asserting their right to dissent is also unfortunate and unacceptable. I do sympathise with them, sometimes.

But, their contestations and plight should not be reduced to a mere political exercise of gaining political competiveness when the underlying causes of the dissent on the Barotse Question should be conceived within the broader context of rural poverty in Zambia and democratic governance representation.

The issues I here seek to share with you were evoked by the sentiments recently expressed by General Malimba Masheke and (maybe) shared by his peers on the incarcerated individuals from Western province. And indeed the general thought that “little attention has been paid to Western Province”, and thus that it is the poorest region in Zambia. But be mindful that these are issues that I have always held and expressed in one form or the other.

That Western province is the poorest and least developed province in Zambia, is not a subject of debate. Similarly, that rural Zambia has comparatively been neglected for sometime in our country’s development history is not a subject of debate. What is debatable and what citizen’s should question given today’s worrisome polarity of our political space is the legitimacy of criticisms of the causes of poverty and underdevelopment in parts of our country, irrespective of a regional dimension or within the rural-urban dichotomy.

To argue that a president that has been in office for a period of slightly more than two years is responsible for this unacceptable and undesirable situation in some regions of our country is a travesty of reason.

First, the measure of any government's commitment to socio-economic development is not only the extent to which a government institutes mechanisms to redress underdevelopment, but more so the extent to which a sitting government or administration accepts the failure of preceding governments. This, I believe, has in the last decade been acknowledged by subsequent presidencies.

Second, there is a general assumption in this country by politicians and political commentators that as a people we are afflicted with historical amnesia, we are analytic, obsequious and gullible. Historical amnesia, in this particular case, is the state of forgetting acts of political elitism and power appropriation by individuals tasked with the governance of a people.

Thus, the Barotse Question should be conceived within the framework of poverty, development and governance representation.

The objective facts of poverty in Zambia are known (figures not reproduced as not permitted in blogs)

What is evident on poverty statistics in Zambia is that indeed Western province has over time had the worst levels of poverty, but so do other rural provinces in the country.

This picture is similar even if we considered indices like employment levels, literacy, or nutrition status of our children in rural Zambia

It is clear that statistics show a rural-urban dichotomy in terms of the social-economic status of our people. In short, rural Zambia has always been short-changed!

The question then is why is this so? Are rural populations under-represented in our democratic governance representative framework?

The answer is NO. The governance representative index by regional groupings and or ethnic groupings does not show any overt marginalisation.

In my unorthodox opinion it is clear that democratic representativeness as practiced in Zambia (and indeed most of the developing world) has failed the people. Elections, within this framework of a dichotomy of rural-urban/subject-citizen have not served to redress the development injustices of our colonial heritage.

Our practice of democracy overtime has merely created political and governance elites whose interests are at variance with the people they so claim to represent.

The underlying meaning of the socio-economic tensions of people in Western province, I argue provides us a premise upon which us as a people we should interrogate the continuance of poverty of our people in rural areas and the modes of our democratic governance relative to national development. Every province, and indeed most ethnical groups have a relatively equitable representativeness in the governance of our country, but the evident results of this representativeness is abject poverty for most of our people in rural areas. And this is the scenario in which eminent persons like General Malimba Masheke and his peers should interrogate their sentiments on the victims of the Barotse Question.

Democracy and governance representation in its current practice, has failed the people. And past, present, and may be future leaders, have failed/and will fail if we do not interrogate the fundamental basics of democratic representations, political and socio-economic accountability to the people, and national development.

The obtaining concerns and contentions on the Barotse Question should serve to provide us a premise for interrogating our governance modes. Political and governance elitism has been characteristic of our democratic governance realities.

There should be nothing partisan about the Barotse Question. To reduce it to a partisan question, when a myriad opportunities to redress the fundamental issues inherent in socio-economic tension in rural Zambia as provided in the Constitutional Review processes we had over the years, does not serve the National interest.

Thus, it is unfortunate that the Barotse Question is being used for political competitive advantage, and not as a framework for governance rethink. We are just victims of our failures of yesterday.

I here ague that eminent persons like General Malimba Masheke and his peers should be honourable enough and say to the people of Zambia, “that us the political and governance elites have failed the people of Zambia and indeed rural provinces like Western province over time, and we apologies”, instead of evoking anti-government sentiments when the objective facts of the country’s governance representativeness show a trend that is not commensurate with the obtaining poverty levels in rural Zambia.

Undoubtedly, it is evident that in the last half a decade some semblance of a national development framework to redress the lost gains of rural provinces, like Western province, has been put in place. But to expect gains today is fallacious.

Eminent persons like General Malimba Masheke and his peers should shed their political elitism, which in any case has been a historic cause of social and traditional tension in Western province since the struggle for independence, and in the post-independence era. Lozi political elites and Lozi traditionalists have been at different ends of the governance pendulum in Zambia’s nation-state building process.

Eminent former leaders in this country should show leadership by allowing interrogation of their failings as a means of providing a framework for reconciling the historic divide between the political elites and the traditionalists. It is illogical for them to want us to believe that elitism is not responsible for the underdevelopment of rural provinces like Western province.

Political elites are surely cognisant of the fact that the dialectics of traditional authority in Western province (and indeed other provinces) have never been interrogated within the paradigm of the country’s development frameworks. For example, to what extent, have they at any one particular time in our history, interrogated the opportunities and constraints of customary land tenure realities obtaining in rural provinces like Western province? Have these political elites, ever argued for a statutory paradigm that recognises customary land tenure rights, as a means of providing security of tenure redeemable (cashable) at financial institutions? What paradigms have they in the past, argued for integrating dialectics of traditional authority within a broader nation-state development agenda?

What advances were made, and who stood in their way to attaining a desirable democratic dispensation and development paradigm shift?

Lest we forget, change has no ownership. It is a process of related and unrelated separates that either work in unison or conflicting, but in the long term lead to a process of socio-economic advancement that is equitable and inviolable. To believe that only the president is the agent of change, when one is a constituent part of that presidency, is a mockery of democratic governance and at worst an insult to the people one so claims to represent.

For me, it is time the citizens of my country and indeed the people of Western province (that are caught in the politicisation of the Barotse Question) challenged the voices of people who so represented them in the past as to what exactly they were doing when afforded the chance to socio-economically represent them in the governance of our country.

Thus, we should as a people start interrogating the legitimacy of criticisms of the people that represented us yesterday, represent us today, and will represent us tomorrow. That rural provinces that have their fair share of governance representation can today have the majority of their population living in abject poverty, inarguably evidences the ailing of our democratic and governance representation.

We should not indulge expressions and criticisms from political elites whose interests and our interests are worlds apart. Let them first acknowledge that today’s victims of the right to dissent are a product of the wrongs of yesterday, as what is obtaining today can not be divorced from elitist and narcissistic tendencies of governance representatives.

Eminent former leaders should not play to the obtaining political rhetoric of the “blame game”. I urge the people of my country wallowing in abject poverty, to realise that these people had the power to change their obtaining reality. To blame the current presidency does not serve to redress the situation.

If their interests and our interests were the same or near to being the same, and there were insurmountable constraints to their aspirations, then let them show evidence that they either attempted to change our circumstances or that they out rightly resigned their public representation portfolios.

Thus, I here again assert that the underlying causes of dissent on the Barotse Question should be conceived within the broader context of rural poverty in Zambia and democratic governance representation. A deliberate attempt to enhance dialogue on the Baroste Question should have been the precursor to our interrogating rural poverty and democratic governance representation.

In this regard, it is a misnomer for one to argue that political rallies which are inherently forums of populist expression are an exercise of one’s “democratic right to discuss and consult each other in a peaceful manner”. To which end, for General Malimba Masheke to argue that a rally can be conceived as a means of exercising one’s “democratic right to discuss and consult each other in a peaceful manner”, is an epitome of sophism.

THE GENERAL AND CONCERNED PARTIES, SHOULD SURELY SHOW LEADERSHIP by advocating for broader consultative means of engaging the Barotse Question. In any case, contentions on the Barotse Question are not new, what is new is the issue’s infusion into political opportunism, arising from the fact that this year our country has general and parliamentary elections.

The government, in this regard is also found lamentably wanting. SOCIO-POLITICAL TENSIONS IN WESTERN ZAMBIA SHOULD HAVE BEEN PROVIDED A DEMOCRATIC SPACE IN WHICH THE GOVERNMENT ACTS AS THE FACILITATOR. The argument that the State of Zambia can only discuss with the Baroste Royal Establishment (BRE), though legally valid, is legitimately invalid. The legality of this argument is premised on the argument that the parties to the Barotse Agreement were “Kenneth David Kaunda Prime Minister of Northern Rhodesia on behalf of on behalf of the government of Northern Rhodesia”, and “Sir Mwanawina Lewanika the Third, K.B.E., Litunga of Barotseland on behalf of himself, his heirs and successors, his Council and the chiefs and the people of Barotseland”. Thus, it should follow that the recognised entity when contestations on the agreement occur is the BRE. This can be argued to be legal, BUT NOT LEGITIMATE!

We should always be mindful of the fact that legality (lawfulness) and legitimacy should be clearly distinguished and understood in a broader context. The individuals in Western province that so expressed their views that the Agreement has been abrogated have a legitimate claim to their actions, as the legal signatory to the Agreement was acting on their behalf. The Baroste Question should provide a framework where the Government of Zambia inviolably accepts that legitimacy does not deal with whether actions of its citizens are exercised according to the Law.

Legitimacy is a question of whether these acts meet with what is publicly perceived to be fundamental and acceptable. This includes issues of fair and equitable practices, and recognition of the right to dissent. The law can not be reduced to an opportunistic and convenient conduit of control and domination by Government. Thus, I have argued in my protestations of the manner in which the dissent on the Barotse Agreement was handled, that the dissenting views should have been conceived within a question of legitimacy and not the legalistic purview that is clearly evident in the Government’s position on the issue.

The Government of Zambia, having the fiscal means and logistics, should have provided devolved assemblies for the Litunga, his heirs and successors, his Council and the chiefs and the people of Barotseland to interrogate and discuss concerns on adherence to the Baroste Agreement. With such assemblies, being inclusive of all ethnic groups that historically constituted Barotseland. Dissenting organised groups, irrespective of whether they are registered entities within the Laws of Zambia, would then surely have found space in these assemblies to articulate their views to a wider discerning population that have interest in the historic and colonial nation-state of Barotseland, and its positioning in today’s State of Zambia.

In short the Government of Zambia did not necessarily have to talk to these groups, as the assemblies would have provided them the needed space. And, critical of all, the political opportunism currently manifest on the Barotse Question would not have had space to evolve to the present undesirable and unacceptable dimensions.

Since the Barotse Question is now being used as a tool for political opportunism and political competitive advantage, we are, if not redressed, losing an opportunity for a rethink of our democratic representativeness vis-à-vis national development.

I urge the Government of Zambia to recognise that even if legally the individuals incarcerated for asserting their right to dissent may have contrived in their actions, within the premise of the Barotse Question they do have a legitimate claim to dissent. And inarguably, the disjoint between rural poverty and governance representatives is inherent in their claims.

Conceived outside the rhetoric and satirical manoeuvres of political opportunists, I vehemently believe that they are victims of the failures of our past.

I urge, here, that they should be released unconditionally, and that Government then proceeds with facilitating devolved assemblies in which they can express their concerns through production of a blueprint for dialogue with Government on the Barotse Question.

FAILURE TO DO SO WILL ESCALATE THE INDULGENCE AND UNACCEPTABLE USE OF THE BAROTSE QUESTION AS A POLITICAL COMPETITIVE TOOL BY A PARODY OF A MYRIAD OF POLITICAL OPPORTUNISTS WHO HAVE THE LEAST INTEREST IN THE BAROTSE QUESTION, AND INDEED REDRESSING THE RURAL POVERTY AND GOVERNANCE REPRESENTATIVE DISCONNECT INHERENT IN OUR COUNTRY.

Lastly, being that, I am from academia in this country, my last concern on the Barotse Question is that we, in academia, in our country have been comatose, as we have been on a number of governance contentions in our country.

There is need for a broader national and academic discourse on the Barotse Question, and more so the duality of our governance (statutory vis-à-vis traditional). Surely, us academia we should strive to interrogate paradigms of integrating the dichotomy of our governance realities as a means of enhancing socio-economic development in Zambia. The social tensions in Western province are inarguably inherent in the dialectics of our duality of governance, and indeed our everyday competing realities of traditionalism and statutory governance and behaviours.

Continuance of the supremacy of statutory governance frameworks that do not integrate governance frameworks under which the majority of our people exist, merely breeds political and governance representative elitism. With such political and governance representative elitism simply serving to enhance master-servant/patron-client/subject-citizen paradigms of governance that rarely serves the interests of our people.

To which end, the Barotse Question, irrespective of how one conceives it, evidences that in Zambia the power to represent and to participate effectively is dichotomous. The dichotomy being mostly rural-urban, there should be neither space nor tolerance for political opportunism, and its associated foolery of popular aggrandisement.

In retrospect, although I find the legitimacy of criticism of some eminent persons in this country a travesty of reason, in it we should accept exists the beginning of the questioning of our governance representativeness.

I end, by quoting Stefan Lindemann who writes: “Access to positions of political and administrative power is important for competing social groups in that it provides them with visible recognition, a ‘say’ in decision making and control over government resources”.

The question is, if our democratic and governance representativeness is so near even and thus allowing for greater spaces of influence in national development, why then is it that rural provinces like Western province are underdeveloped?

Who Do They Represent?

2010-11-22T20:21:00.000-08:00

On my blog of June 5, 2010, titled "Mmembe: Simply a Victim of the Wrongs of Yesterday", I wrote that "there is nothing sinister or euphoric about Fred Mmembe's conviction and incarceration. Contempt of court laws have always existed and will continue to exist".

I further wrote that "Mmembe's case should be debated in the broader sense and not the narrow self-serving purview of political rhetoric that it is currently being given".

Today, there is an unnerving silence on Emmanuel Mwamba's incarcerat...ion on contempt of court from the Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) in Zambia. Are CSOs in Zambia telling us that Mmembe deserves exemption from the law, and Emmanuel does not?

Exactly who do these so-called human rights and good governance CSOs represent, if they only make noise when it is a media person that is incarcerated? Please CSOs in Zambia STOP the manifest lack of impartiality, else it will be clear that it was NOT the contempt of court law that you were against, but merely the incarceration of Mmembe on the same law that many Zambians are incarcerated.

A Divine Law?

2010-11-15T07:04:00.000-08:00

There is a presumption of divinity in the debate of section 37 of the ACC ACT No. of 1996, and more so from the voices that continually are trying to convince me that "abuse of office", has been removed in the proposed Anti-Corruption Bill of September 16, 2010. Slowly, there is no more doubt in my mind that if it is not mere political rhetoric on their part, then this "law" in their minds is of such olympian excellence that it has been inspired by the gods. The question then is. Can the gods be wrong? No. The gods are never wrong, it is always the interpretation that is wrong.

In demystifying the assumed removal of section 37, and my consistent argument that nothing in the proposed Bill (when read together with the Forfeiture of Proceeds of Crime ACT No. 19 of 2010) has resulted in what is being argued as "the removal of abuse of office offence", I first start by advising that a good argument can never be founded on binary logic. A good argument is founded on dialectics.

Thus, that I argue the contrary to what is the mainstream in the private media, should NOT be construed to mean I accept Government's defense of the issue. I don't. Their rationalisation and mine are not founded on the same reasoning. There are merits and demerits in the Government's defense, but that should not be something any reasoning person should concern themselves with. The proposed Bill, and other anti-corruption laws are there in black and white. One does not have to argue in a manner that George Kunda or Mulongoti argues. That is, their opinions, and whereas one may or may not respect their opinions, I expect that logic should dictate that any person commenting on the issue should synthesise the proposed Bill in the broader context of anti-corruption.

If they did so, then the divinity so proclaimed in section 37 will still be evident.

To understand this, we have to consider section 37 in its pure nakedness.

Section 37 au naturel

Section 37 titled “Possession of unexplained property”, reads as follows:
(1) The Director-General, the Deputy Director-General or any officer of the Commission authorised in writing by the Director-General may investigate any public officer where there are reasonable grounds to believe that such public officer –
(a) has abused or misused his office position or authority to obtain property, wealth, advantage or profit directly or indirectly for himself or any other person;
(b) maintains a standard of living above that which is commensurate with his present or past official emoluments;
(c) is in control or possession of pecuniary resources or property disproportionate to his present or past official emoluments; or
(d) is in receipt of the benefit of any services which he may reasonably be suspected of having received corruptly or in circumstances which amount to an offence under this Act.

(2) Any public officer who, after due investigation carried out under subsection
(1), is found to –
(a) have misused or abused his office, position, or authority to obtain advantage, wealth, property or profit directly or indirectly;
(b) maintain a standard of living above which is commensurate with his present or past official emoluments;
(c) be in control or possession of pecuniary resources or property disproportionate to present or past official emoluments; or
(d) be in receipt of the benefit of any services which he may reasonably be suspected of having received corruptly or in circumstances which amount to an offence under this Act;

shall, unless he gives a reasonable explanation, be charged with having, or having had under his control or in his possession of pecuniary resources or property reasonably suspected of having been corruptly acquired, or having misused or abused his office, as the case may be, and shall, unless he gives a satisfactory explanation to the court as to how he was able to maintain such a standard of living or how such pecuniary resources or property came under his control or into his possession or, as the case may be, how he came to enjoy the benefit of such services, be guilty of an offence.

With hindsight, what I have found interesting about this section is its title. Possession of unexplained property. And this is where the argument that "abuse of office" has been removed becomes obtuse. The critical salient features of this section are property, wealth, advantage and profit.

1. Is the section not prescribing that possession of unexplained property is a crime?

2. Is the section also not prescribing that gaining advantage or profit (whether tangible or intangible) is a crime?

3. Isn't the section telling us that property, wealth, advantage and profit is a manifestation of one misusing or abusing his office, position, or authority?

4. Conversely, isn't a public officer who, being concerned with any matter or transaction falling within, or connected with, that public officer’s jurisdiction, powers, duties or functions, corruptly solicits, accepts or obtains, or agrees to accept or attempts to receive or obtain for oneself or for any other person any gratification in relation to such matter or transaction (Section 99 (that is, Abuse of authority of office) of the Penal Code ACT CAP 87 ) misusing or abusing his office, position, or authority?

If 1 to 4 are correct, then how can section 37's divinity not be read in the proposed Bill and the Forfeiture of Proceeds of Crime ACT.

I argue this, because possession of unexplained property is criminalised in Section 54, Seizure of property, of the proposed Bill. This section provides that:

(1) Where in the course of an investigation into an offence under this Act, an officer has reasonable grounds to suspect that any movable or immovable property is derived or acquired from corrupt practices, is the subject matter of an offence or is evidence relating to an offence, the officer shall, with a warrant, seize the property". (4) For the purpose of this section, “property” means real or personal property of any description, and includes money and any interest in the real or personal property..

And note that Section 68 of the proposed Bill provides that, the provisions of the Forfeiture of Proceeds of Crime Act, 2010, shall apply in relation to the seizure and forfeiture of any proceeds or property corruptly acquired by any person and any other related matters.

Section 31, Non-conviction based forfeiture order for tainted Property, of the Forfeiture of Proceeds of Crime ACT No. 19 of 2010 provides that:
“Subject to subsection (2), where a public prosecutor applies to the court for an order under this section and the court is satisfied on a balance of probabilities that the property is tainted property, the court may order that the property, or such of the property as is specified by the court in the order, be forfeited to the State.”

The Forfeiture of Proceeds of Crime ACT defines tainted property as:
“means – (a) any property used in, or in connection with, the commission of the offence; (b) property intended to be used in, or in connection with, the commission of the offence; or (c) proceeds of the offence”.

Critically, if one has wealth, property or income disproportionate to one’s known source of income; or wealth, property or income disproportionate to one’s known source of income - these situations are inarguably criminalised in the proposed Bill and the Forfeiture of Proceeds of Crime ACT.

Further, gain or advantage is criminalised in Section 27, Conflict of interest, of the proposed Bill.

The bottom line is, the provisions of the divine law are provided in the proposed Bill and the the Forfeiture of Proceeds of Crime ACT.

In retrospect, undoubtly, thence, the assumed divinity of section 37 and the rhetoric arising is merely evidence of a narrow interpretation of anti-corruption laws and indeed the political polarisation inherent in this country. The divine law is still intact, only its interpretation is misconstrued.

Many thanks. Comments are welcome.

Debunking section 37 of the ACC ACT

2010-11-02T00:38:00.000-07:00

The debate on the ACC Bill of September 16, 2010 centres on the assumed “removal” of section 37 of the ACC ACT No. 42 of 1996. Note that the existing law is being reviewed and not amended. It is clearly important that a discussion of whether section 37 is being “removed” or “reviewed” be considered within this context. The international instruments that Zambia is party to provide for legislative reform in a threefold manner. That is, (a) criminalisation of corrupt acts; (b) Seizure of proceeds of crime; and (c) Protection of witnesses or whistleblowing. To which end, early this year two new laws critical to strengthening anti-corruption in Zambia were enacted. These are, the Forfeiture of Proceeds of Crime ACT No. 19 of 2010, and the Public Interest Disclosure (Protection of Whistleblowers) No. 4 of 2010.

The salient assumptions of section 37 of the ACC ACT No. 42 of 1996 are that:

(a) Wealth, property or income disproportionate to one’s known source of income (that is, present or past official emoluments) is a product of abuse or misuse of public office or authority.

(b) Wealth, property or income disproportionate to one’s known source of income is a product of a corrupt act,

The question then is – has the likelihood that where it is a product of abuse or misuse of public office or authority been addressed in the proposed Bill? This has been addressed when the proposed Bill is read together with the Forfeiture of Proceeds of Crime ACT No. 19 of 2010.

Section 31, Non-conviction based forfeiture order for tainted Property, of the Forfeiture of Proceeds of Crime ACT No. 19 of 2010 provides that:

“Subject to subsection (2), where a public prosecutor applies to the court for an order under this section and the court is satisfied on a balance of probabilities that the property is tainted property, the court may order that the property, or such of the property as is specified by the court in the order, be forfeited to the State.”

The Forfeiture of Proceeds of Crime ACT defines tainted property as:

“means –

(a) any property used in, or in connection with, the commission of the offence; (b) property intended to be used in, or in connection with, the commission of the offence; or

(c) proceeds of the offence”.

In addition, The Forfeiture of Proceeds of Crime ACT defines property as including

any real or personal property, money, things in action or other intangible or incorporeal property, whether located in Zambia or elsewhere and includes property of corresponding value in the absence of the original illegally acquired property whose value has been determined.

Manifestations of an individual having abused or misused his office position or authority; or maintaining a standard of living above that which is commensurate with his present or past official emoluments, is the physical existence of tainted property!

Section 54, Seizure of property, of the proposed Bill provides the following:

“(1) Where in the course of an investigation into an offence under this Act, an officer has reasonable grounds to suspect that any movable or immovable property is derived or acquired from corrupt practices, is the subject matter of an offence or is evidence relating to an offence, the officer shall, with a warrant, seize the property".

(4) For the purpose of this section, “property” means real or personal property of any description, and includes money and any interest in the real or personal property.

In addition, Section 68 of the proposed Bill provides that, the provisions of the Forfeiture of Proceeds of Crime Act, 2010, shall apply in relation to the seizure and forfeiture of any proceeds or property corruptly acquired by any person and any other related matters.

Further, Part III of the proposed Bill, Corrupt Practices, criminalises misuse or abuse of a public office for private advantage or benefit, and this is provided in a variety of ways, which is more extensive than the existing law.

For example, Section 21, Corrupt use of official power, of the proposed Bill provides that:

“(1) A public officer who, being concerned with any matter or transaction falling within, or connected with, that public officer’s jurisdiction, powers, duties or functions, corruptly solicits, accepts or obtains, or agrees to accept or attempts to receive or obtain for oneself or for any other person any gratification in relation to such matter or transaction, commits an offence”.

The proposed Bill defines gratification as:

“gratification” means any corrupt payment, whether in cash or in kind, any rebate, bonus, deduction or material gain, benefit, amenity, facility, concession or favour of any description and any loan, fee, reward, advantage or gift, or any other thing obtained as a result of the corrupt misuse or abuse of public funds or property, other than a casual gift.

Evidence of criminalisation of the most known manifestations of corruption is provided the outstanding features of the proposed Bill relating to:

(a) Manifestations of corruption such as opportunities for financial kickbacks in the design or selection of uneconomical projects, procurement, public bidding (tenders), illicit payments of "speed money" to government officials to facilitate the timely delivery of goods and services to which the public is rightfully entitled (like permits and licenses) are provided in Sections 19 to 23, 25, 28, 31, and 32.

(b) Manifestations of corruption arising from conflict of interest are criminalised in Section 27, Conflict of interest. This new offence is timely, as the country can no longer have public servants running business become suppliers to the very departments they work for.

(c) Manifestations of corruption of theft or embezzlement of public property and monies, and tax evasion are now criminalised in Section 33, Corrupt acquisition of public property and revenue. Of particular interest in Section 33 are the offences of acquiring public property or a public service or benefit; diverting any public property for that person’s or another person’s benefit; and, obtaining any exemption, remission, reduction or abatement from payment of any tax, fee, levy or charge required to be paid under any law; commits an offence.

Thence, I observe in "A view from a broken mirror", a detailed reading of the Bill will show that it does actually strengthen anti-corruption in the country, as it is cognisant of the fact that corruption is a set of behaviours and practices that have manifestations that can have deleterious effects on individuals, society, business, and the State.

The Barotse Question - Epitomising historical romanticism?

2010-10-26T23:46:00.000-07:00

In writing this article, I first seek to categorically state that in our attempts to conceive the Barotse Question of self-determination and secession as an inane emotional attachment to historical romanticism, and a threat to the existing ‘assumed’ state of peace, lie the very threat to our nation-state’s peace and stability.

That a people that once felt a sense of existing in a defined nation-state today seek to live apart from that nation-state is itself indicative of the fact that something has gone miserably wrong.

In expressing myself here in, I do not seek claim to prodigious knowledge on the Barotse Question, but merely attempt to communicate the inherent threat of conceiving the issue as a question of historical romanticism. It is in this respect that I address the question to the best of my learned ‘ignorance’ and often-detached sense of belonging.

First, on the Barotse Question are the voices premised on arguments that it is neither socially relevant nor politically correct in today’s context. I argue that the social relevance of calls for self-determination lie in the political and historical cognisance of the undeniable fact that attempts to assert the right to self-determination and indeed the extreme threat of secession have through history shaped today’s role model political and governance structures.

Strategies and structures of devolution of power, decentralisation, federalism are inherently socio-political conflict resolution strategies with a historical genesis embedded in the very process whose social relevance is today found to be abhorrent. The often times upheld governance structures of states like the USA are the classical illustration of this fact.

On the other hand, the argument of the Barotse Question’s political incorrectness arises simply because of today’s Zambia’s obtaining political environment. This is a political environment where political correctness only allows expression and attitudes that do not and are unlikely to disturb the status quo as determined by the obtaining political philosophy of those that are in power. In an atmosphere of intolerance and reluctance to dialogue, I hasten to submit that a call for self-determination is politically incorrect. But, one has to ask - where from then is the threat to peace and stability, the Barotse Question’s proponents or the political governance fragility of the existing nation-state?

However, if we convince ourselves that the obtaining political reality is in itself politically correct, then, the political correctness of a call for self-determination should be seen in its catalytic light. That is, the unavoidable need to change our present governance structures so as to allow for more representative structures of governance.

Premised on the foregoing, I submit that a concerted resurgence of the call for self- determination can have desirable effects on Zambia’s present mode of governance. May be the missed opportunities of the 1993-5 Constitutional Review (and ended the one that just ended)regarding devolution of power to the provinces can become a reality!

Second, and maybe louder, are the voices arguing that the Barotse Question is founded on historical romanticism. These voices I find to simply symbolise the unfortunate unconscious indoctrination of being in an assumed peaceful and stable multi-ethnical nation-state.

Of concern to these voices are the questions:

1. What is the extent (boundaries of the Barotse kingdom and on what legitimacy are these boundaries?

2. Do the other non-MaLozi (or subgroups) inhabitants of Barotse also have a claim to self-determination or will the King impose his views?

3. What are the contentions in the Barotse Agreement?

First I must state here that in addressing these concerns one is inevitably drawn into the polemics and diametrical questions of definitions. This I will try to avoid. In my simplest understanding, a nation is a ‘common’ sense, a feeling, an idea of belonging to an ethnic or multi-ethnic group. This ‘common’ sense, or idea can arise through ancestry, immigration, and or whatever other factors of human mobility that result in one finding himself or herself with a sense of belonging to that particular nation.

Here in, lie the polemics, for the latter, also shows a nation is nothing much but an evolution of historical romanticism!

The concept of a state, on the other hand, regularises and legitimises this amorphous entity, through institutions and structures. The institutions and structures often embody mechanisms that facilitate or enforce observance of duty or obedience to the state.

Barotseland was and is still a nation-state. This, the British, too, recognised, least the Barotse Agreement would not have been entered into. Any arguments to the contrary are merely an inept attempt to falsify history. Thence, relative to defining Barotseland’s geographic space, one is drawn to the understanding that boundaries are simply the extent of physical land occupation or ownership of a people with the idea of belonging. This extent, history has shown, can even imply such areas as at the time occupied by the group of people in question. (C.f., The case for Israel). However, given that Africa’s nation-states are rooted in the historical context of colonialism, concerns of geographic space should be seen in this light. And should, above all, recognise the fact that the nation-state as a western colonisation process dismembered Africa’s already existing boundaries defined by ‘common sense’, or ‘idea of belonging’.

In retrospect, the question of geographic legitimacy, becomes one of setting an epoch that will define an ‘acceptable’ criteria by which any people seeking self-determination can be provided concessions as to the extent of their claim to a historical nation-state. I must mention here that unfortunately the western societies’ definition of Africa’s nation- states is today what is internationally recognised, and is, in part, not only the genesis of contemporary Africa’s problems, but also the inherent problem to Africa’s redefinition of its boundaries.

Further, the concerns relating to other non-MaLozi’s inhabiting Barotseland invokes in me the issue of inclusion and exclusion. If we are to assume my conceptualisations of a nation and state provided here in are to some degree valid, then we must acknowledge the fact that the Barotse nation-state was one characterised by inclusion of all groups who paid homage to the King. We should, here in, however acknowledge the fact that historically Barotseland was highly socially stratified. There was the royal. And there was the commoner. But, the governance structures were (is) such that the Prime Minister (Ngambela) is always a commoner!

On the question of the contentions in the Barotse Agreement, I here simply surmise that the underlying premise of the contentions is the recognition of Barotseland as an autonomous state, whose autonomy should have been guaranteed in the post colonial period. I am afraid there are various views on this, and in the end it is just as polemical as the question of a nation-state.

Lastly, there have also been arguments that the Barotse Question’s likely effect of fragmenting an already existing nation-state is counter presently obtaining global trends of amalgamations of countries in the West. This, I find to be a blatant misinterpretation of the genesis of perceived global trends. Simply because this view conveniently or ignorantly, does not recognise the fact that fragmentation and the consequent process of devolution of power due (in part) to assertions of self-determination are the founding stones of these nations that today can easily economically amalgamate.

In addition, the proponents of the foregoing concern often seek refugee in Africa’s decaying adage of ‘strength in unity’, without embodiment of the requisite fact that such strength only exists were the consequent processes of conflict resolution such as devolution of power have evolved.

In ending my submission, I first seek to argue that counter-proponents of the Barotse Question should at least attempt to avoid the unconscious inclination of considering whosoever propagates or supports a particular notion or assertion as doing so out of a sense of ethnical or political affiliation. This is an unconscious inclination that we surely at this stage in history should liberate ourselves from, as it is merely a microcosm of the country’s political leaders.

Secondly, I argue that reasoning is a process that deals with the separates and seldom the totality. Thence, if one has to follow the separates argued here in, one should surely acknowledge the fact that if the Barotse Question is simply historical romanticism, then surely the nation-state we so cherish and call Zambia is indeed nothing but the epitome of colonial historical romanticism. And that our existence as a nation-state is not founded on ‘strength in unity’, but on the sustenance of a status quo that is embedded in political intolerance and command approaches to governance.

Ours is an illusion of well being in a geographic space defined by forces that knew little of existing social spaces. That the continent is today beset with myriad crises is simply evidential of the dangers of not only accepting that illusion, but more so seeking coherence in the illusion. What we should seek are the assumed ‘abhorrent’ lessons of calls for self-determination and or secession. That is the conflict resolution strategies inherent.
The Barotse Question should never be conceived as a recipe for chaos. The imminent fragmentation of a nation-state underlying such an issue should in my ‘ignorance’ be conceived as the fragmentation of existing unacceptable political structures!

Hence, in conclusion I ask - Does self-determination mean fragmentation of existing nation-states?

[The Barotse Agreement in pdf download is available at http://miliko.vndv.com]

(first published in The Monitor Issue No. 64 Friday July 23 - Thursday July 29, 1999)

A View from a Broken Mirror

2010-10-26T08:47:00.005-07:00

- fencing the ACC Bill of September 16, 2010

1.0 About the Mirror
We all wake up everyday, and look at the mirror. The mirror always shows an image of ourselves as we hope to look that morning. If it does not, we polish ourselves until we are happy with the image. Hah, beautiful! We then continue with our morning chores as the image we have now seen will not scare the world outside of our private spaces.

Many Zambians, ranging from Radio talk show chatterboxes , tabloids, politicians, lawyers to NGO leaders, have looked at (or heard of) the proposed review of the ACC ACT No. 42 of 1996, and are not happy with the image now reflected as the Anti-Corruption Bill of September 16, 2010. Some of these profess an inarguable understanding of anti-corruption, and hence their understandable anger, and well throughout submissions on the issue. Others profess a disputable understanding of anti-corruption, and hence the allegations that the ruling party seeks to protect “thieves” or those that abuse public office for private gain.

The problem with all the contentions is, first that there is a fundamental absence of an understanding that at a distance anti-corruption is a compendium of broken mirrors. Thus, for us to understand whether the proposed review of the current ACC ACT justifies the opposition so far evidenced, these mirrors have to be coalesced into one.

Second, it is also clear that a good number of the so-called newsworthy individuals that have commented on this issue have not read the Anti-Corruption Bill of September 16, 2010.

2.0 The Contentions
From the onset, it must be clear that in this discussion, there is no portending of one being the epitome of the anti-corruption discourse. The discussion simply attempts to clarify why most of the concerns are not founded in an understanding of anti-corruption, but merely a rhetorical argument founded on mistrust and positioning anti-corruption in a single mirror.

The debate on the ACC Bill of September 16, 2010 centres mostly on the “removal” of section 37 of the ACC ACT No. of 1996, and the definitions of corruption or corrupt behaviours in the Bill, thereof. At face value, this section has been removed.

Section 37 titled “Possession of unexplained property”, reads as follows:
(1) The Director-General, the Deputy Director-General or any officer of the Commission authorised in writing by the Director-General may investigate any public officer where there are reasonable grounds to believe that such public officer –
(a) has abused or misused his office position or authority to obtain property, wealth, advantage or profit directly or indirectly for himself or any other person;
(b) maintains a standard of living above that which is commensurate with his present or past official emoluments;
(c) is in control or possession of pecuniary resources or property disproportionate to his present or past official emoluments; or
(d) is in receipt of the benefit of any services which he may reasonably be suspected of having received corruptly or in circumstances which amount to an offence under this Act.

(2) Any public officer who, after due investigation carried out under subsection
(1), is found to –
(a) have misused or abused his office, position, or authority to obtain advantage, wealth, property or profit directly or indirectly;
(b) maintain a standard of living above which is commensurate with his present or past official emoluments;
(c) be in control or possession of pecuniary resources or property disproportionate to present or past official emoluments; or
(d) be in receipt of the benefit of any services which he may reasonably be suspected of having received corruptly or in circumstances which amount to an offence under this Act;

shall, unless he gives a reasonable explanation, be charged with having, or having had under his control or in his possession of pecuniary resources or property reasonably suspected of having been corruptly acquired, or having misused or abused his office, as the case may be, and shall, unless he gives a satisfactory explanation to the court as to how he was able to maintain such a standard of living or how such pecuniary resources or property came under his control or into his possession or, as the case may be, how he came to enjoy the benefit of such services, be guilty of an offence.

(3) Where a court is satisfied in proceedings for an offence under subsection (2) that, having regard to the closeness of his relationship to the accused and to other relevant circumstances, there is reason to believe that any person was holding pecuniary resources or property in trust for or otherwise on behalf of the accused, or acquired such pecuniary resources or property as a gift, or loan without adequate consideration, from the accused, such pecuniary resources or property shall, in the absence of a satisfactory explanation by or on behalf of the accused be deemed to have been under the control or in the possession of the accused.

(4) In this section, "official emoluments" include a pension, gratuity or other terminal benefits.

The salient assumptions of this section are that:
(a)Wealth, property or income disproportionate to one’s known source of income (that is, present or past official emoluments) is a product of abuse or misuse of public office or authority;
(b)Wealth, property or income disproportionate to one’s known source of income is a product of a corrupt act; and that,
(c)The burden of proof that one did not abuse or misuse public office or authority, or indulge in a corrupt act resulting in him or her having wealth, property or income disproportionate to one’s known source of income is not on the State (the accuser).

2.1 The State’s Defence
The State in proposing the “removal” of provisions of section 37 in the “contentious” Bill contends that:
(a)In the current socio-economic dispensation, wealth, property or income disproportionate to one’s known source of income is not necessarily a product of abuse or misuse of public office or authority, or a corrupt act, as such an individual could be involved in running a business that provides the disproportionate wealth, property or income;
(b)The section’s shifting of the burden of proof on the accused individual negates the Constitutional provisions of the Constitution of Zambia ACT of 1996. That is, Article 18 (2) Provisions to secure protection of law, which reads “Every person who is charged with a criminal offence (a) shall be presumed to be innocent until he is proved or has pleaded guilty”. This can be read together with Article 18 (7), which states that, “A person who is tried for a criminal offence shall not be compelled to give evidence at the trial” and that,
(c)Abuse of office is provided in Section 99 (that is, Abuse of authority of office) of the Penal Code ACT CAP 87 of the Laws of Zambia.

2.2 The Objectors Arguments
Objectors (NGOs, Opposition political parties, lawyers and others), on the other hand, contend the following on the “removal” of section 37 in the current ACC ACT:
(a)“The Bill in its current form, fails to adequately align with the provisions of regional and international convention especially when behaviour and corrupt practices like Abuse of Office and Illicit enrichment, which are prominently addressed in the key conventions are left out ” Transparency International – Zambia (TIZ) submission to Parliament ; and mostly that,
(b)The term “abuse of office” is conspicuously absent in the proposed Bill, which is not in line with internationally accepted definitions of Corruption.

3.0 The Dialectics
The State’s argument of the likelihood of an individual accruing wealth, property, or income disproportionate to one’s known source of income, as not necessarily being a product of abuse or misuse of public office or authority, is valid. The question then is – has the likelihood that where it is a product of abuse or misuse of public office or authority been addressed in the proposed Bill? Yes, it has been addressed, as shall be discussed later, in particular the introduction of the conflict of interest provisions.

However, it is also here argued that the State’s argument that section 37 negates Constitutional provisions is inept. This is because Section 31, Non-conviction based forfeiture order for tainted Property, of the Forfeiture of Proceeds of Crime ACT No. 19 of 2010 provides the contrary.

Note that, Section 31 (1) provides that:
“Subject to subsection (2), where a public prosecutor applies to the court for an order under this section and the court is satisfied on a balance of probabilities that the property is tainted property, the court may order that the property, or such of the property as is specified by the court in the order, be forfeited to the State.”

Section 31 (2), further, provides that,
“Where a person claiming an interest in property to which an application relates satisfies the court that the person –
(a) has an interest in the property; and
(b) did not acquire the interest in the property as a result of any serious offence carried out by the person and (i) had the interest before any serious offence occurred; or (ii) acquired the interest for fair value after the serious offence occurred and did not know or could not reasonably have known at the time of the acquisition that the property was tainted property;

The court shall order that the interest shall not be affected by the forfeiture order, and the court shall declare the nature and extent of the interest in question.

The Forfeiture of Proceeds of Crime ACT defines tainted property as:
“means –
(a) any property used in, or in connection with, the commission of the offence; (b) property intended to be used in, or in connection with, the commission of the offence; or
(c) proceeds of the offence”.

It is, thus, argued that this section undoubtedly shifts the burden of proof. This clearly implies that it is the accused person who has to prove that the property was not acquired illegitimately.

Further, whereas objectors have admirably argued their case, and indeed that they have acknowledged the strengthening of anti-corruption in some sections in the proposed Bill is commendable, some of their contentions are, however, disputable.

First, on defining corruption, the ACC ACT No. 42 of 1996 defines corrupt as:
“the soliciting, accepting, obtaining, giving, promising or offering of a gratification by way of a bribe or other personal temptation or inducement, or the misuse or abuse of a public office for private advantage or benefit, and corruptly shall be construed accordingly”.

The proposed Bill, on the other hand, defines corrupt as:
“the soliciting, accepting, obtaining, giving, promising or offering of a gratification by way of a bribe or other personal temptation or inducement, and “corruption” shall be construed accordingly”.

The contentions in this definition is the absence of the words “misuse or abuse of a public office for private advantage or benefit”. To which end, TIZ observes that:
“The new definition is not compliant with the United Nations Convention Against Corruption and the SADC Protocol Against Corruption. There is no justification why Abuse of power or office should not be one of those behaviours and practices prohibited by the Anti Corruption law in Zambia unless if such has to be legalised. Under Article 19, under, Abuse of functions, the UNCAC Convention provides that “Each State Party shall consider adopting such legislative and other measures as may be necessary to establish as a criminal offence, when committed intentionally, the abuse of functions or position, that is, the performance of or failure to perform an act, in violation of laws, by a public official in the discharge of his or her functions, for the purpose of obtaining an undue advantage for himself or herself or for another person or entity”.

Section 99, Abuse of authority of office, in the Penal Code, provides that:
“(1) Any person who, being employed in the public service, does or directs to be done, in abuse of the authority of his office, any arbitrary act prejudicial to the rights or interests of the Government or any other person, is guilty of a misdemeanour. If the act is done or directed to be done for purposes of gain, he is guilty of a felony and is liable to imprisonment for three years.

(2) A prosecution for any offence under this or either of the two last preceding sections shall not be instituted except by or with the sanction of the Director of Public Prosecutions”.

This section clearly does provide for misuse or abuse of a public office for private advantage or benefit. The critical terms that are being contended, are evident in this section. These are “abuse of the authority of his office” and, “for purposes of gain”. In addition, as shall be shown in succeeding sections, the provisions of Article 19 of the United Nations Convention Against Corruption are substantively provided in the proposed Bill.

To which end, the statement that “there is no justification why Abuse of power or office should not be one of those behaviours and practices prohibited by the Anti Corruption law in Zambia unless if such has to be legalised ”, is infelicitous. This statement is also indicative of the lack of understanding that the ACC ACT No. 42 of 1996 is NOT solely the only anti-corruption law in Zambia. In any case, the criminalisation of corrupt behaviours and practices is provided in the proposed Bill .

Moreover, whether the removal of section 37 negates anti-corruption by a mere omission of expected terms or that it is provided for in the Penal Code is pedantic. It is an argument that simply enhances the view from a broken mirror. This is because Part III of the proposed Bill , Corrupt Practices, criminalises the actual manifestations of misuse or abuse of a public office for private advantage or benefit.

For instance, Section 21, Corrupt use of official power, of the proposed Bill provides that:
“(1) A public officer who, being concerned with any matter or transaction falling within, or connected with, that public officer’s jurisdiction, powers, duties or functions, corruptly solicits, accepts or obtains, or agrees to accept or attempts to receive or obtain for oneself or for any other person any gratification in relation to such matter or transaction, commits an offence”.

Another concern on the State’s argument that the Penal Code does provide for abuse of office, is that its removal from the ACC ACT (which is not the case as will be more evident from the succeeding), implies that it is within the jurisdiction of the Police and not the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC). It is further argued that possession of unexplained property is not covered in the proposed Bill.

This is grave sophism.

Part III of the proposed Bill, which is within the jurisdiction of the ACC, provides for criminalisation of the most known manifestations of corruption, and clearly does cover illicit property or possession of unexplained property. In addition, there is no rule of thumb, which says only the Police can handle Penal Code offences. The ACC has used the Penal Code in the past.

It is also, here, argued that the NGOs’ concern that Section 99 of the Penal Code in referring to Abuse of authority of office as a misdemeanour minimises the seriousness of corruption as this “makes it less serious with weak sanctions and penalties”, is regrettably evident of objectors not having read the proposed Bill in its entirety. Hence, it is argued that, if Section 21 of the proposed Bill adequately covers the concern on misuse or abuse of a public office for private advantage or benefit, then it should be inarguable that its being considered misdemeanour in Section 99 of the Penal Code is obtuse. This is because the penalty for Section 21, Corrupt use of official power, provided in Section 40, General penalty, is severe.

Section 40, General penalty, states:
“A person who is convicted of an offence under this Part, for which no penalty is provided, is liable -
(a) upon conviction, to imprisonment for a period not exceeding ten years;
(b) upon a second or subsequent conviction, to imprisonment for a term of not less than five years but not exceeding ten years; and
(c) in addition to any other penalty imposed under this Act, to forfeiture to the State of any pecuniary resource, property, advantage, profit or gratification received in the commission of an offence under this Act”.

Second, illicit property or possession of unexplained property is not only covered under the manifestations of corruption that the proposed Bill extensively addresses itself to, but also Section 31, Non-conviction based forfeiture order for tainted Property, of the Forfeiture of Proceeds of Crime ACT No. 19 of 2010, as shown above.

Premised on the core of most of the dissenting views on the proposed Bill, it is undoubted that a reservation that will be raised on the definition of tainted property is surely that the words “corruptly obtained” are not in the definition.” The bottom line, however, is that any property acquired in the commission of an offence is tainted property. Thence, if we accept that corruption is an offence, then this surely addresses the concern of illicit property or possession of unexplained property. It must be understood that illicit property or possession of unexplained property has no single law enforcement jurisdiction domain, and its provision in the Forfeiture of Proceeds of Crime ACT allows all law enforcement agencies the leeway to apply it in pursuit of their legal mandates.

Even if we are to accept that the provisions of the Forfeiture of Proceeds of Crime ACT do not substantively address the issue of illicit property or possession of unexplained property, it is argued, here, that Section 35, Concealment of property, of the proposed Bill does so. Section 35 states:
“A person who –
(a) converts, transfers or disposes of property, knowing that such property is the proceeds of corruption or related offences for the purpose of concealing or disguising the illicit origin of the property or of helping any other person who is involved in the commission of the offence to evade the consequences of that person’s action;
(b) conceals or disguises the true nature, source, location, disposition, movement or ownership of or rights with respect to property which is from the proceeds of corruption or related offences; or
(c) acquires, possesses or uses any property with the knowledge at the time of receipt, that such property is from the proceeds of corruption or related offences; commits an offence and is liable, upon conviction, to imprisonment for a period not exceeding two years.”

If we read this provision together with Section 31 in the Forfeiture of Proceeds of Crime ACT, the “balance of probabilities that the property is tainted property” can subsume the assumption of knowledge of commission of an offence.

Third, evidence of criminalisation of the most known manifestations of corruption is, here now, shown in the outstanding features of the proposed Bill relating to:
(a)Manifestations of corruption such as opportunities for financial kickbacks in the design or selection of uneconomical projects, procurement, public bidding (tenders), illicit payments of "speed money" to government officials to facilitate the timely delivery of goods and services to which the public is rightfully entitled (like permits and licenses) are provided in Sections 19 to 23, 25, 28, 31, and 32.
These sections provide for anti-corruption in the contexts of Corrupt practices - by, or with, public officers; by or with, private bodies; by, or with, agents; or members of the public or private. This is, with respect to solicitation, offering of bribes and any gratification as an inducement or reward for doing or forbearing to do, or for having done or forborne to do, anything in relation to any public matter or transaction, actual or proposed.

Note that, Section 28, Gratification forgiving assistance, etc., with regard to contracts, also criminalises such manifestations. Section 28 states:
“(1) A public officer who, directly or indirectly, by oneself, or by, or in conjunction with, any other person, corruptly solicits, accepts or obtains, or agrees to accept or attempts to receive or obtain, from any person for oneself or for any other person, any gratification as an inducement or reward for or otherwise on account of, that public officer giving assistance or using influence in, or having given assistance or used influence in –
(a) the promotion, execution or procurement of (i) any contract with a public body or private body for the performance of any work, the provision of any service, the doing of anything or the supplying of any article, material or substance; or (ii) any sub contract to perform any work, provide any service, do anything or supply any article, material or substance required to be performed, provided, done or supplied under any contract with a public body or private body; or
(b) the payment of the price, consideration or other moneys stipulated or otherwise provided for in any contract or sub contract; commits an offence.
(2) A person who corruptly gives, promises or offers any gratification to any public officer as an inducement or reward for, or otherwise on account of, such public officer giving assistance or using influence in, or having given assistance or used influence in –
(a) the promotion, execution or procurement of; or
(b) the payment of the price, consideration or other moneys stipulated or otherwise provided for in; any contract or sub-contract commits an offence”.

Noteworthy is that the succeeding cited Section 28, also provides for manifestations of corruption as in the sale of official posts, positions, or promotions; nepotism; or other actions that undermine the creation of a professional, meritocratic civil service.

Particular mention should also here be made of Section 32, Coercion of investor , which states that:
“A public officer who –
(a) performs or abstains from performing any act in that public officer’s capacity as a public officer;
(b) expedites, delays, hinders or prevents the performance of any act; or
(c) assists, favours, hinders or delays any person in the transaction of any business with a public body; in order that an investor or potential investor is coerced, compelled or induced to abandon the investment or induced to abandon the investment to the advantage of another person, commits an offence and is liable, upon conviction, to a fine of not less than two hundred thousand penalty units or to imprisonment for a period not exceeding two years, or to both.”
(b)Obstruction of justice and interference in the duties of agencies tasked with detecting, investigating, prosecuting illicit behavior, and arbitrating (the judiciary) is criminalised in Section 24, Corruption of witness, and in Section 30, Obstruction of justice . Section 30, for instance in part, states:
“A person who, by use of corrupt means interferes with the exercise of official duties by a judge, magistrate, judicial officer or any other arbiter or law enforcement officer, commits an offence and is liable, upon conviction, to imprisonment for a period not exceeding two years”.
(c)Manifestations of corruption arising from conflict of interest are criminalised in Section 27, Conflict of interest. This section states:
“(1) Where a public body in which a public officer is a member, director, employee or is otherwise engaged proposes to deal with any person or company, partnership or other undertaking in which that public officer has a direct or indirect private or personal interest, that public officer shall forthwith disclose, in writing to that public body, the nature of such interest.
(2) Where a public officer or a relative or associate of such public officer has a personal interest in a decision to be taken by a public body, that public officer shall not vote or take part in any proceedings or process of that public body relating to such decision.
(3) A public officer who contravenes subsection (1) or (2) commits an offence and is liable, upon conviction, to imprisonment for a period not exceeding three years.
(d)Manifestations of corruption of theft or embezzlement of public property and monies, and tax evasion are now criminalised in Section 33 , Corrupt acquisition of public property and revenue. Section 33 states:
“(1) A person who fraudulently or unlawfully-
(a) acquires public property or a public service or benefit;
(b) diverts any public property for that person’s or another person’s benefit;
(c) mortgages, charges or disposes of any public property; or
(d) obtains any exemption, remission, reduction or abatement from payment of any tax, fee, levy or charge required to be paid under any law; commits an offence .

(2) A person whose functions concern the administration, custody, management, receipt or use of any part of public revenue or public property commits an offence if that person –
(a) fraudulently makes payment from the public revenue for - (i) goods not supplied or not supplied in full; or (ii) services not rendered or not adequately rendered; or
(b) willfully fails to comply with any law or applicable procedures or guidelines relating to the procurement, allocation, sale or disposal of property, tendering of contracts, management of funds or incurring of public expenditures.

(3) A person who commits an offence under this section is liable, upon conviction, to imprisonment for a period not exceeding five years.

(4) For the purposes of this section, “public property” means real or personal property, including public funds or money of a public body or under the control of, or consigned or due to, a public body”.

Lastly, the ACC’s jurisdiction on corruption during an election is now provided for in Section 34. This Section states that the Commission has jurisdiction to investigate and prosecute any offence of bribery prescribed under the Electoral Act, 2006.

In retrospect, the foregoing shows that the proposed Anti-Corruption Bill of September 16, 2010 is cognisant of the fact that corruption is a set of behaviours and practices that have manifestations that can have deleterious effects on individuals, society, business, and the State. From the foregoing, it is evident that the Bill to a considerable extent addresses the manifestations, and indeed the behaviours and practices characterising corruption or a corrupt act.

4.0 A View from a Broken Mirror
When I started writing this paper on the so much talked about proposed Anti-Corruption Bill of September 16, 2010, I did mention that at a distance anti-corruption is a compendium of broken mirrors, and that the concerns are mostly a fundamental absence of this understanding.

The issues I have discussed in the foregoing, inarguably show a critical failure of reasoning mostly premised on the assumption that we should have silo-mentality, and the inability to coalesce the broken mirrors into one. That is, in our laws we should read the exact terminologies that exist in international instruments; in a manner that we as individuals or NGOs construe; or, that we should only look at the single piece of the mirror that makes us look beautiful.

To understand, anti-corruption efforts and its strengthening, thereof, we should discard silo-mentality. We should sometimes accept that the terms like “abuse or misuse public office or authority” can be substantively provided for by simply criminalising the manifestations of these behaviours , or even writing them differently. Thus, I here strongly argue that the proposed Bill has irrevocably achieved anti-corruption strengthening.

It should irrefutably be accepted that manifestations are more evidential than actual terminologies describing an offence, and easier from a prosecution perspective. This is however, not to say terminologies are redundant, but to merely fence the importance of such an approach.

I, further here argue that, adherence to international instruments cannot be solely from use of terminologies. It should be from whether the deleterious effects the instrument seeks to address are substantively covered.

In retrospect, the Anti-Corruption Bill of September 16, 2010 is only a view from a broken window, if one does not synthesis its provisions and that of other laws critical to anti-corruption. It grates to think just because a particular terminology is used in an international document or a law from some other country, then it is right that that terminology should also be reflected in our documents, with the requisite commas and full stops.

To which end, the question that should be asked (if we do not see the famed anti-corruption catchwords) is - are the manifestations of abuse or misuse public office or authority or corruption itself, per se, provided for in the proposed bill, and other laws critical to anti-corruption? The answer is definitely a function of whether anti-corruption in the proposed Bill is viewed from a broken mirror or coalesced mirrors!

This paper is available on http://miliko.vndv.com/

Mmembe: Simply a Victim of the Wrongs of Yesterday

2010-06-05T01:06:00.000-07:00

There is nothing sinister or euphoric about Fred Mmembe's conviction and incarceration. Contempt of court laws have always existed and will continue to exist. If we begin to understand why jurors in America are sequestered during some trials, then we will begin to make informed decisions on the contempt of court laws. Let us learn to be objective. I find that as a people we react with emotions and not reason. Mmembe is not the first to be cited and convicted on the archaic law of contempt of court, and he will not be the last as long as archaic laws are not reviewed or repealed. As hard as we may find it, Mmembe is a victim of laws we could have reviewed decades ago. I have not pity whatsoever, because as a people we continually suffer from historic amnesia.

Why then do we cry now, when we have hundreds of our fellow citizens imprisoned without bail over several archaic laws. There are hundred of our fellow ciizens languishing in jails on bailable offences simply because they have no sureties or permanent domicile. Mmembe's case should be debated in the broader sense and not the narrow self-serving purview of political rhetoric that it is currently being given. RB did not write the archaic laws. How come we are not asking why opposition MPs have not lobbied for repeal or review of the archaic laws in our statutes. It is our narrow consideration of issues that lead this country nowhere.

The wrongs of yesterday, will always have victims tomorrow.

A Comedy for Donor Appeasement

2010-05-31T15:00:00.001-07:00

On July 13 2009, I wrote a blog “Unnatural offences, unnatural thinking!”, contesting the hullaballoo over the Post editor (Chansa Kabwela or something like that. I always get the name wrong). I observed that Kabwela’s being charged with one of the many unnatural offences in our laws is a contradiction of natural thinking. I argued that “it is reflective of unnatural thinking”.

Today, after patiently waiting for comments from our very informed Civil Society Organisations on an event that should have brought this issue back to the human rights discourse in Zambia and indeed, the Media front pages, I am dismayed and yet again forced to revisit what it is that Civil Society Organisations in Zambia affirm to be defending.

I argued many years ago that human rights values or belief systems are internalised, cherished and protected either because of an extreme experience or because of a result of the recognition of the functionality of the value or belief system to an individual. And further that for, the defence of human rights in Zambia, to be effective and contribute to an acceptable politico-socio-economic environment and governance mode, it is important that defenders embody functionality in a much broader sense that citizens can identify with and duly recognise the functionality of human rights. In addition, I vehemently argued that human rights defense should NOT be the observable narrow functionality targeting Donor appeasement, and sustenance of new power structures that often have seen individuals emerge as the new political leaders; or indeed the narrow functionality of human rights as an international academic exercise distant from the impoverished reality of citizens in the developing world.

At least, however, I am glad that MISA Zambia’s Henry Kabwe issued a statement on the matter, though I disagree with his statement that “the move will assist in restoring government's credentials.”

I will come back to this later. First, let us take a walk into memory lane, with only a few examples.

February 11, 2002. Fred M’membe was arrested and charged with defamation of the President Mwanawasa. M’membe was detained at Woodlands Police station and was released on bond when his lawyers sought the intervention of the Director of Public Prosecutions. The police alleged that Fred M’membe and FDD Lusaka Central MP Dipak Patel had defamed the president by calling him a cabbage in an article in the Post Newspaper of January 25.

June 7, 2002. Editor-in-chief Emmanuel Chilekwa, Kingsley Lweendo, Shadreck Banda and Jane Chirwa appeared before a magistrate court for allegedly defaming the President. The quartet was charged with defaming Mwanawasa in a story that appeared in newspaper edition number 17.

None of these cases ended in a conviction, they were discontinued. But, both made headline news and CSO noises to the effect that in the same year Civil Society in Zambia affirmed the need to (and I quote):

“To remove existing media laws that criminalise journalism. Laws relating to Defamation of the President, Publishing False News, Sedition, Espionage are deterrents to investigative journalism. For instance, Section 69 of the penal code, relating to Defamation of the President, has been used to silence dissenting views and criticism of government or key office bearers such as the president. This archaic piece of legislation makes it an offence to defame the President. It remains an offence under this provision for anyone, with intent to bring the reputation of the President into hatred, ridicule or contempt, to publish any defamatory matter, whether in writing, print, word of mouth, or any other form or manner.” (c.f. Political Governance in Zambia- A Civil Society Position, 2002)

Eight years later, we learn that Darius Mukuku was on March 18, sentenced by the Ndola Magistrate's court to eighteen months imprisonment for defamation of the President. Darius Mukuku was on May 25, Africa Freedom day, pardoned by the President of the Republic of Zambia. President Rupiah Banda ordered the Minister of Home Affairs to remit in whole the sentence slapped on Darius by Ndola Magistrate Court on March 18, 2010.

The only Civil Society Organisation to have commented on the issue is MISA-Zambia. MISA-Zambia is reported to have “expressed gratitude to President, Rupiah Banda for pardoning Darius Mukuku who was sentenced to 18 months imprisonment for defamation of the president. And that, “MISA Zambia Chairperson, Henry Kabwe says the move will assist in restoring government's credentials.” (http://www.muvitv.com/newsindepth.php?id=3481)

I find it derisory that organisations that seek legitimacy on the basis of there being human rights defenders and or indeed good governance defenders can not acknowledge a milestone on the archaic law of defamation of the president. Irrespective of whether President Rupiah Banda sought political advantage by pardoning Darius Mukuku or whether he did it out of his own good will, the objective fact of the matter is that he pardoned the man who was convicted of defaming the presidency.

Inarguably, this puts the Police in an awkward position relative to enforcement of this law. Notwithstanding the latter, President Rupiah Banda’s act inadvertently provides an opportunity for CSOs to urge/lobby that this law be reviewed or repelled. That CSOs have not ceased this window of opportunity is tragic, and brings into question whose interests they claim to defend.

This act by President Rupiah Banda should further be conceived beyond the narrow purview of “restoring government's credentials”. What credentials are being restored when the Police are about to charge Frank Bwalya with the same archaic law?

In my mind I have no doubt that CSOs’ silence and the narrow purview of the issue, simply evidences the tragic reality that human rights and good governance defense in Zambia is simply a comedy for donor appeasement. The individuals that so claim to be defenders have never internalised the values they so claim to institutionally defend. President Rupiah Banda should be engaged on this archaic law, and not let the issue slide into obscurity as we do with many issues. He has opened the window, and surely I expect CSOs to be clambering through the window all the way to Parliament.

But I guess I am just a dreamer!

Down on memory lane!

2010-05-20T04:34:00.000-07:00

If I remember, on July 16, 2002 or there abouts I was one of the NGO types that marched from Northmead to parliament grounds seeking the removal of FJT's immunity. I was then head of mission - research and development at Afronet. We sought the lifting of FJT's because, as Afronet we also had information that included the fact that USD47m from the privatisation of the Roan Antelope Mining Corporation was not accounted for; and that USD20.5m was allegedly paid by the Chiluba government for weapons which never arrived. In his speech to parliament, Mwanawasa simply made known our suspicions.

Further, in our position paper ""Conman without Borders - Ari-Ben Menashe", we did allege that Beni Menashe was paid more than US$6 million for the maize he never delivered. The popularly known as Carlington maize saga.

With hindsight, I am bemused that CSOs (we were called NGOs then), never asked why FJT ended up being charged over a so-called plunder matrix of payments from an intelligence account. Of the 12 counts in the judgement before me, there is not a single mention of millions!

And how did the British have a grandstand seat in the whole saga? Let us think again. There are missing links.

Rethinking 2011

2010-05-04T00:31:00.000-07:00

Now they are concluding that Mufumbwe violence is a microcosm of 2011. How inanalytic can we be! By-election events can only be representative of a major election, when you remove the participation of other persons who will be busy seeking their own re-election in over 3000 polling sites. Deploying "tujili jili" cadres to all these sites, will be a feat I seek not to miss.

A Thought on April 29 By-Elections

2010-04-27T08:57:00.000-07:00

Mufumbwe: voter ratio 3:1, i.e., UPND/PF: MMD. Milanzi 4:1, i.e., MMD to UPND/PF.

Analysis:
(a) Lower ratio win in either scenario denotes gains by opposing Party;
(b) Voting pattern more an ethnical factor in Milanzi; and,
(c) Mufumbwe UPND/PF candidate had stronger showing in last election. Muzungu is a chief's protégé, and evidence shows chief's do not influence voting.

Summation. Test of Opposition gains is in Milanzi.

On FB on April 10, 2010
Milanzi, Mufumbwe by-elections prediction based on an analysis of parliamentary election results from 1991 to 2006, shows that the MMD has the least chance of winning. The two scenerios are that single opposition parties have consistently won in these constituencies, and that the single instancies when the MMD has won,... the opposition as a sum total of their votes still mustered a slim majority.In addition, Mufumbwe shows a high probability of success by the Opposition coalition, not just numerically, but also that the MMD candidate's creditials are scarred by the miserable loss in 1991.

Peter! I am sorry

2010-03-27T07:34:00.000-07:00

On Kasisi Children’s Home website , at the bottom left hand corner, there is a link that reads “from the webmaster”. When you follow it, you will come to an article I wrote many years ago. The article is titled “Footprints in the Sands of History”. It is a tribute to the sisters, mothers and children of Kasisi Children’s Home. A Home in which I have over the years found comfort, support and love.

I write “I came to your world as a stranger, but today I am a friend, a brother, and son. Today, I know there are no other footprints I seek to tread, but yours. In my journey, I know I will falter and meander, but in my heart I know that since your footprints in the sands of history are an inerasable monument, from the distance I will always see your footprints.”

It is an old article, and has been on the website for quite some time now. A week ago Mamusia[2] asked me when I was going to write another article. 'I do not know', was at the time the most logical answer I could give, not knowing that tomorrow there will be an event that will force me to think twice.

Over the years, I have reduced on writing mostly because I believe Zambians do not read. It seems to me they are still steeped in folklore as the most effective means of communication. What is said by mouth often travels much faster than what is in print. The only exception is if what is in print is slander or an untruth, then it surely travels as fast as it will be conceived to be a truth. In fact, most often what is said by mouth is based on innuendo and the most absurd.

Anyway, the bottom line is, today, I yet again seek to communicate in the form I know and understand best. Words of pen.

And this is because Peter was scrounging in our garbage bin!

I have not done much that I know is written in the stars. My destiny. It is written in the stars, that ours shall be the kingdom. It is written in the stars that we are all stars. Our ways should light the path of darkness, not only for ourselves but more so for those that come before us, for those that do not have the strength to walk with us, and for those that fell before us. We are the light, and our ways, not our words, should be the living monuments of that light.

Children come in from the dark into our world, frail and weak, and it is our promise that the children run and play in open skies and greener green open fields.
It is our promise that tomorrow, the children walk with us, as we should be the light.

It is our promise that tomorrow, the children too become the light for those to come before them.

This is the promise, and we should always try not to break it.

This has been my promise. To be the words that are written in the stars. I broke that promise. And it is really not the promises we keep that matter most. It is those we break.

With hindsight a tear always falls. I will tell you why.

I first came to have a sense of an unjust act at a very early age. Six or seven years old. Or may be it was when I deciphered the words in the bright stars on a cloudless night. Or may be this is because there are events in our lives that never fade. They scar you so deep that you will always remember the event like you are seeing it recur today. Psychologists always argue that the traumas of our childhood will always come to haunt us. But often we never think much about this psychology construct until it hits you full in the face.

Long time ago, when most children enjoyed being children, and the roads and open fields where the playground. We decided to try a game of golf. We had got tired of the usual mocking around pretending to be Pele or Godfrey Chitalu. Our golf clubs, were grass-slashers. Golf balls, anything that could be hit and fly!

With darkness fast closing on us, and the different moms screaming their lungs out for us to go in doors, the golf game reached a crescendo. It was then it happened.

"She is fine guys. Look she is not crying or making noise."

"But she is bleeding badly."

"Of course, women bleed badly even from just a scratch."

And with our well rationalised child observations, we ran into our respective homes.
Little did I know that my father stood at a distance. Listening. Watching.

Never thought much of the incident, as me and my younger brother were being scrubbed. Mom always scrubbed us like we have never had a bath in a year or so.
It was only when we were about to walk into the living room, that even at that young age my heart nearly failed. I walked into the living room like a zombie, while my younger brother zoomed off into the bedroom with the speed of light!

My father looked at me and simply said. "It is those that scream without raising their voices that need our help the most."

He asked mom to help him take the woman to the clinic, and asked us to clean up the blood that had messed his "Persian carpet". At that time we found it strange that he had allowed the woman to bleed all over his "Persian carpet", when he always ranted whenever we stepped on it with muddy shoes: which we deliberately did quite often.

As they walked out into the dark, I heard mom say. "It is those that hear the silence that make a difference in the lives of others."

Looking back, it is then that I knew there is a promise we all should keep.

It is then that I knew silence must be heard.

It is then that I knew we are all stars.

Since then, in all my years, I have listened to the silence, the screams only the deaf hear, and indeed tried to keep the promise of what is written in the stars. This is because my parents lived the promise, and in latter years Kasisi, the footprints in the sands of history that is an inerasable monument, are that promise.

In due fairness to myself, I know in my heart I have kept promises. And that they have been kept is a story that needs not to be told.

It those I have broken, whose story needs to be told.

Peter.

Peter is a promise that I broke.

I worked in human rights activism, not because it was vogue, but because I believed I could change the lives of those not able to stand up for themselves. It is within this purview of life and destiny that I met Peter.

We did a lot of good work as human rights activists, but with hindsight we broke a lot of promises. Our failure was that we gave people hope, but we did not give them a new life. Hope is a feather in a whirlwind, and it dissipated as soon as our shadows disappeared with the sun disappearing on the horizon.

Peter, like many others was a victim of the State. The police tortured him and broke his soul. Like the young soldier in a Copperbelt town that ended up in a wheel chair after the police broke his knees, we picked them up and promised we will light the path of darkness their broken souls were heading into by seeking justice for them.

If I may digress. It is hard and sad that today I am writing my deepest inner feelings in promises I broke. But may be it will help those that also read the words written in the stars. The young soldier in the Copperbelt town could have had justice prevail, but we failed because among us are those who claim to keep the promise but merely do so for their own personal pursuits and egos. These individuals have lamentably failed to comprehend that that there is no higher calling than that where a human puts the interests of others before his or hers. Or like I write somewhere (I can not remember where) - "it is only when you move beyond fascination with yourself that you can change other lives".

We were youthful and we sincerely believed our ways could light the path of darkness, not only for ourselves but more so for those that come before us, for those that do not have the strength to walk with us, and for those that fell before us. Peter, the young soldier on the Copperbelt fell before us, and we picked them and gave them the promise of hope.

For over ten years, I gave Peter the hope that the State (government of Zambia) will compensate him for the torture he and his friends (they were five and three are long dead) suffered at the hands of the police. I gave him this hope, because I took it upon myself to pursue the case. Visited offices, called friends in public offices that could help me seek closure to the case and compensation, thereof. Human Rights Commission, and the offices of the Solicitor General, and Attorney General. I also even consulted lawyer friends in case we may need legal action to further our cause.

In all this time, Peter would religiously turn up at my door, and I would religiously assist him get to the one office he was always told "to come tomorrow". I would sometimes call the office so as to make it easier for him, and the person at the other end of the line would courteously give me hope that today is the day our overs ten years of seeking justice will come to a close.

As the hope faded, I watched Peter degenerate.

In earlier years, Peter was a happy young man. He would turn up at my door smiling. His poor clothing and shoes looking clean. We would sit and chat of what to do next.
As the years passed, the clothing and the shoes started having holes, and I started giving him my old clothing and shoes. One day in the cold season, he even asked for warm bedding for his mother.

It was then the cleanliness, too, started fading, the alcohol smells started increasing, and hunger signs started being etched on his face. We now started giving him food.

His frequency at my door increased and I started to be agitated. My daughter did not mind Peter. I always actually sensed she pitied him and that she really did not understand the bond between us. But because each day I saw Peter was a failing to me, I really could not bring myself to explain to her why Peter always came to our door.

My calls to the offices that could help Peter also started to be infrequent, as I now knew like the young soldier on the Copperbelt, I could not keep the promise I made to Peter. I could not help him seek justice. The journey had run its course. I had failed to keep to the words written in the stars.

One day in October 2009, I told Peter I could no longer help him. I, with great sadness, told him I had failed, and it is time he accepted there will be no justice, no compensation for him. I also told him to reduce on knocking on my door.

I wanted to tell him to stop being on my door, but I did not have the strength.
Peter did not shed a tear. He just looked at me like he did not understand what I was saying. I later shed a tear.

Peter now started hanging out by the gate. Every time I drove out in the morning, Peter would come to my car window, hand stretched out hoping I would give him some money or food. But I did not, as I really now wanted him out of my life. I had failed destiny and I hoped he would understand that.

A month later, I was standing on my balcony enjoying a cup of coffee when I saw Peter. The hand holding the cup limped. A tear fell.

Peter was scrounging in our garbage bin!

For over ten long years I had stood by Peter. We gave Peter food. We gave him clothing. But I did not light the darkness so that Peter can have a meaningful life.

I did not even know Peter. In all these years I never even knew where Peter lived. I never knew who his mother was. I never even knew where he slept.

Peter! I am sorry. I heard your silence. You screamed without raising your voice, and I heard.

Peter! I am sorry. I hope somewhere you have found peace and have it in you to forgive me for wasting your life by giving you false hope.

Peter! I am sorry. You may smell, be in torn clothing, but deep in my heart I know you are the light. I write the words in this article to your memory and thank you for allowing me to walk with you. The journey with you was a lesson that I will cherish and never forget in my life.

We are all stars. The light.

I failed you, but you taught me humanity. You taught me the struggles of keeping the promise. That our ways should light the path of darkness, not only for ourselves but more so for those that come before us, for those that do not have the strength to walk with us, and for those that fell before us.

Peter! I am sorry, but thank you.

NB: This article is a true-life story and not a work of fiction. Peter exists and is not a creation of my imagination. Thank you for reading this article, and I hope we will always be the light for others less fortunate than ourselves.

An Interesting Read

2010-03-27T01:50:00.000-07:00

If you fight against the wrongs of a Mugabe, by portraying him as having absolutely no goodness and as personifying all the evil in the world, while avoiding or failing to see nothing but goodness in Morgan, you are likely to fortify the wrong while failing to prepare for the good that should substitute it after you have gotten rid of what you identified, perhaps rightly as bad, because you diverted focus on the total spread of the badness, which had never been a monopoly of the Mugabe. You would also, perhaps, have prepared the ascendancy of a Morgan, whose suitability you had not critically and thoroughly questioned.

On a similar note, If you fight against the wrongs of a Banda (and let us not forget that even Levy had his share of being similarly fought!), by portraying him as having absolutely no goodness and as personifying all the evil in the world, while avoiding or failing to see nothing but goodness in a substandard and sectarian Sata, a money-mongering and regionalist HH and a Eurocentric Chongololo, equally money-monger type (and you can’t even rule out possibility of such being, even by default, as sectarian (religiously self- righteous claims to being picked by God!) and regionalistic, like, perhaps, young Chipimo, and God-knows who else! You are likely to fortify the wrong while failing to prepare for the good that should substitute it after you have gotten rid of what you identified, perhaps rightly as bad, because you diverted focus on the total spread of the badness, which had never been a monopoly of the Banda or MMD that is so easy And popular to
attack and scandalise. You are also, perhaps, preparing and facilitating for the ascendancy of people whose suitability you had not critically and thoroughly questioned.

NB: I reproduce this write-up from a friend who remains anonymous, as I found it to be an interesting read.

God, Life & Reason - Today's excerpts

2010-02-10T22:25:00.000-08:00

“It is not the promises we keep that matter most. It is those we break.”

“Life is not like a movie. You can not hit rewind. So make the most of it while you can.”

“Catholic mass is a melancholic choreography of hope. Often I hope the cacophony of tongues I always hear from the other side of the road, could instil hope and not dread.”

“The cotton you have weaved into a trouser cloth garment can not be weaved into another garment.”

“Just because that is how you have been doing something in the past, does not mean that is how you should be doing it in the future.”

”Beauty, intelligence is noticed. It does not have to be advertised.”

“It is those that scream without raising their voices that need our help the most.”

“Tears always fail the poor as every day is a funeral.”

"It is those that hear the silence that make a difference in the lives of others."

Footprints in the Sands of History

2010-02-10T22:22:00.000-08:00

Okay, forget about the lack of intelligence in a world that boasts of an educated population. Yes, for a second, forget the fact that there are persons on this earth that have about fifty-four thousand and seven hundred (54 750) nappies to launder in a year - and all because of love.

Take just a second for introspection on your existence. If tomorrow, the children were to follow your footprints in the sands of history, where will they end up?

Dear friends, I ask this question simply because every day when I reflect on our footprints in the sands of history, I always shudder. Not with fear, but with an unnerving sadness. Will my footprints in the sands of history, reflect a humane existence?

Two intellections I write somewhere come to mind.

The first is that, "States fail simply because some individuals can no longer bear their moral debt.”

The second is, “The fact that we have security of life amidst increasing numbers of the poor in our population simply means that our moral debt is everyday increasing. Thus, acting to reduce our moral debt is the only means by which our security of life can be sustainable and not the mere safeguard of the law".

The point being, our footprints in the sands of history can only have meaning if the others are an integral part of our good fortunes. That we continue existing, while others cling to the knife-like edges of human existence is a fallacy.

Today, I urge you to understand that we afford to have peace of mind and security, not because of the force of the law, but that someone out there who, through no fault of his or hers, deserves a life as just as ours has footprints in the sands of history that reflect a higher morality than ours. We owe this often unknown, unnoticed and beautiful person our gratitude, not the State.

Fact is, it is often the majority of those that are needy that do not resort to crime or to behaviours disruptive to our privileged existence. It actually is those that are privileged that are a threat to our existence. Its either they feel that their moral debt is overburdening, or their immorality is such that they abuse the underprivileged into criminality. The latter can be directly or by providing erroneous beliefs that it pays to be immoral.

In this scenario, the individuals that suffer the most are children. That we have children existing in an abyss of need is not because their parents were wanting. Could be their parents were wanting (in extreme cases of deviance), but often its because our predecessors footprints in the sands of history were such that they created an existence where today's children find themselves in an abyss of need.

It really does not take much to change our footprints in the sands of history. Kasisi Children's Home, Mother Teresa, et cetera, have exemplified this through out our life's journeys. The tragedy is, we seem not to learn. Our footprints in the sands of history continually reflect an existence that is self-conceited.

How can it be so difficult to alter our footprints in the sands of history? If, it has occurred to you that no child should die of hunger, no child should die of disease communicable through birth, then it surely should be that tomorrow you will walk a journey that will leave footprints in the sands of history that reflect an inner love for humanity. If the contrary, then surely your existence is simply a lie.

Friends, if I may close my clutter of thought.

Today, I realise how privileged I am. I am privileged not because I am educated and have been able to market my labour for a near decent wage.

No, I am privileged simply because someone unnoticed, unknown and beautiful - who is less privileged than I - has footprints in the sands of history that reflect a strong etch of morality than mine. That unnoticed, unknown and beautiful person’s footprint in the sands of history protects my livelihood. That person can only be a child. That person is indeed the child in all of us, and more so in the less privileged who have not resorted to crime or disruptive behaviours. Children are innocent, and that unnoticed, unknown and beautiful person embodies the innocence of the children.

I owe it to the children to also walk a life’s journey that lightens their days. My desire is that my footprints in the sands of history should be an everlasting monument - a tomb of humanness.

This desire, I also owe to the Sisters, mothers and children of Kasisi Children's Home. Today, I confess. Your footprints in the sands of history are a providential etch in my life's journey.

I came to your world as a stranger, but today I am a friend, a brother, and son. Today, I know there are no other footprints I seek to tread, but yours. In my journey, I know I will falter and meander, but in my heart I know that since your footprints in the sands of history are an inerasable monument, from the distance I will always see your footprints.

Many thanks, and my love to all.

Unnatural offences, unnatural thinking!

2009-07-13T11:00:00.000-07:00

Well, the Post editor saga on alleged indecent photography and publishing such thereof, took me on a journey into the past and in so doing, today's laws of Zambia, in particular the Penal Code. I here cite a few sections!

1. Sentence of death. Section 25. (1) When any person is sentenced to death, the sentence shall direct that he shall be hanged by the neck until he is dead.

2. Defamation of President. Section 69. Any person who, with intent to bring the President into hatred, ridicule or contempt, publishes any defamatory or insulting matter, whether by writing, print, word of mouth or in any other manner, is guilty of an offence and is liable on conviction to imprisonment for a period not exceeding three years.
(No. 6 of 1965)

3. Unnatural offences. Section 155. Any person who (a) has carnal knowledge of any person against the order of nature; or (b) has carnal knowledge of an animal; or (c) permits a male person to have carnal knowledge of him or her against the order of nature; is guilty of a felony and is liable to imprisonment for fourteen years. (As amended by No. 26 of 1933)

4. Indecent practices between males. Section 158. Any male person who, whether in public or private, commits any act of gross indecency with another male person, or procures another male person to commit any act of gross indecency with him, or attempts to procure the commission of any such act by any male person with himself or with another male person, whether in public or private, is guilty of a felony and is liable to imprisonment for five years.
(As amended by No. 26 of 1933).

5. Obscene matters or things. Section 177. (1) Any person who - (a) makes, produces or has in his possession any one or more obscene writings, drawings, prints, paintings, printed matter, pictures, posters, emblems, photographs, cinematograph films or any other object tending to corrupt morals; or (b) imports, conveys or exports, or causes to be imported conveyed or exported, any such matters or things, or in any manner whatsoever puts any of them in circulation; or (c) carries on or takes part in any business, whether public or private, concerned with any such matters or things, or deals in any such matters or things in any manner whatsoever, or distributes any of them, or exhibits any of them publicly, or makes a business of lending any of them; or (d) advertises or makes known by any means whatsoever with a view to assisting the circulation of, or traffic in, any such matters or things, that a person is engaged in any of the acts referred to in this section, or advertises or makes known how, or from whom, any such matters or things can be procured either directly or indirectly; or (e) publicly exhibits any indecent show or performance or any show or performance tending to corrupt morals; is guilty of a misdemeanour and is liable to imprisonment for five years or to a fine of not less than fifteen thousand penalty units nor more than seventy-five thousand penalty units.

Premised on the foregoing citations, surely what the Post editor is being charged with is just one of the many unnatural offences in our laws. It is for this fact that I find the noise being made a contradition of natural thinking. It is reflective of unnatural thinking. That is, it does not conform to the norm. It should be inarguable that these citations reflect a collective proclivity to unnatural thinking among a people.

The norm is that we are a very morally upright and christian people. This is the norm as I know it and as it has been proclaimed. And it is as it has always been reflected in our laws.

It is because of this norm that we still hang people by the neck until death, we criminalise blow jobs, and homosexuality (as in citation 1, 3 and 4). The president is like a god, chief or king, so we can not say anything very bad against him!

Surely if we so claim moral uprightness why are we now frenzied over the Post editor's circumstances? Offences in citation 3 and 4 are deemed offences against morality, whilst citation 5 (Obscene matters or things. Section 177) is deemed to corrupt morals. It is surely is inarguabe that the law being used against her is premised on an assumption of high morality, just as are laws against homosexuality or blow jobs!

If it is now being argued that the law in the Post editor's case is archaic or repressive, then can we also hear voices calling for the review of all other archaic laws.

Let us move away from these forms of unnatural thinking, and which border on hypocrisy. We need to call on the citizens to ensure that the Law Development Commission fulfils its mandate, which in part, is to remove archaic pieces of legislation from the statute book.

This backwater country which I call home never ceases to maze me! I hope tomorrow, the SDA reservations with teaching reproductive organs is not made into law. Or indeed the pictures in biology textbooks are not erased!

A Question of Public Impropriety, Law and Interpretation

2009-07-03T06:42:00.000-07:00

This blog serves to elucidate my criticisms of the voices on the Dora Siliya saga, in particular CSOs.

My consistent arguments are that the Dora Siliya Tribunal findings is more a case of public impropriety, than law. That is, evidence of her committing criminal offences was not manifest.

I have studied the Anti-Corruption Commission Act, Zambia Development Agency Act, 2006, and Public Procurement Act no. 12 of 2008, and failed to find which clauses within the Tribunal allegations and evidence tendered one can argue criminality in the Dora Tribunal saga.

A breach of an Act of Parliament or an act contrary thereof, is not legally an offence or criminal offence, unless that particular Act prescribes an offence and subsequent penalty. This is how the laws of Zambia are provided and it is within this framework that I find the persistent arguments by CSOs lacking in fact, hence my use of the term “misinterpretation of facts”. Public impropriety is addressed administratively, where the law does not provide for offences.

To which end, a president can simply have administrative recourse to an erring public servant, when the law does not provide penalties for a breach. Administrative recourse can be a reprimand, suspension or dismissal.

There is need for CSOs to rethink what they are communicating to the public, and to concern themselves with the gaps in law that serve to perpetuate our backwardness.

For instance, the Tribunal found that:

1. "...Dora Siliya signed a Memorandum of Understanding which committed Government to a sum of Money beyond her Ministry threshold without approval of the Zambia Public Procurement Authority."

2. "...the Minister of Communications and Transport did not follow the requisite tender process in the selection of R.P Capital Partners Limited. It is not the law that the selected tender supplier presents a different proposal from others."

3. "... We certainly are of the view that the Minister did not act above-board in this matter. However as we have stated, there was no evidence that she actually shared information with R.P Capital Partners Limited."

4. "It is the strong view of the Tribunal that Government Ministers must strictly observe the Constitution and the Laws made there under and Government regulations. Breach of the Constitution and the Laws made there under by Government Ministers and officials undermines the Rule of Law and contaminates the Government system as it sends wrong signals to the general citizenry. In the present case we leave Hon. Dora Siliya’s breaches to His Excellency the President to deal with."

I can cite such other findings, which I do not dispute, what I dispute is that these were the allegations brought before the Tribunal, and that these are criminal!

Unless, the Tribunal Report is wrong, the following were the allegations that constituted the proceedings:

- that Dora Siliya breached Section 4 (a) and (c) of the Parliamentary and Ministerial Code of Conduct Act, with the complaints premising this constituting the following:

1. "The first allegation against Hon. Dora Siliya was as follows; (i) As alleged by the first Complainant, the Honourable Minister of Transport and Communication did, against the advice of the learned Attorney- General did award a contract in the sum of US$ 2,000,000 to R.P Capitals Partners of Cayman Island to value the ZAMTEL assets without due regard and / or compliance with the provisions of the Zambia National Tender Board Act, Chapter 394 of the Laws of Zambia (ii) As alleged by the second complainants, the Honourable Minister of Communication and Transport on the 22nd December 2008 signed a Memorandum of Understanding with R.P Capital Partners Limited on behalf of the Government of Zambia, totally disregarding Legal advice from the Attorney- General’s chambers"

2. "The Second allegation was that Hon. Dora Siliya did arbitrarily cancel a duly awarded contract by the Zambia National Tender Board (ZNTB) for the supply, delivery, installation and commissioning of a Zambia Air Traffic Management Surveillance Radar System of Lusaka and Livingstone International Airports awarded to Thales Air Systems of South Africa in favour of Selex Sistemi Integrati of Italy."

3. "The third Complaint against the Hon. Dora Siliya was made by a Consortium of Civil Societies comprising Transparency International Zambia, SACCORD,CITIZENS FORUM, Foundation for Democratic Process, Women for Change,Civil Society for Trade Network, Jesuit Centre for Theological Reflection , Civil Society for Poverty Reduction, Zambia Youth Association Against Corruption and Caritas Zambia. The third complaint charges Hon. Dora Siliya with corruptly receiving K12,500,000.00 public funds."

The Tribunal summation being - "After considering all the evidence, we have found that allegation number two and three have not been proved against Hon. Dora Siliya. But we have found that the first allegation relating to the failure to comply with the legal advice of the Attorney-General and failure to observe tender procedures has been proved."

Allegation number three (3) from CSOs should not have been a part of the allegations. This was alleged criminal activity. How can any reasoning person put it within the Parliamentary and Ministerial Code of Conduct Act? What was the motive? Or did the lawyers misguide CSOs?

I ask this in the light of the fact that it is the duty of citizens to report criminal activities and if possible provide information on criminal activities. Failure to divulge such information is a crime. Why was such evidence not tendered in the proper legal process?

"Guilty by Warped Reasoning?"

2009-07-03T06:02:00.000-07:00

First posted on June 25.

Again we were subjected to misrepresentations of the Chirwa Tribunal Findings on Dora Siliya during the Press Conference Q and A. What exactly do our journalists read?

The Tribuynal never found Dora guilty of all what the Petitioners had alleged. Period! "We find that Hon Dora Siliya did not breach Section 4 of the Parliamentary and Ministerial Code of Conduct Act as alleged...we have found that allegation number two and three have not been proved against Hon. Dora Siliya...But we have found that the first allegation relating to the failure to comply with the legal advice of the Attorney-General and failure to observe tender procedures has been proved..." - D. Chirwa Tribunal Findings.

Can CSOs and the media in this country stop the nonsense of misrepresenting facts! In the public domain, Dora's case is one of public impropriety and not law. I urge the CSOs, Media and Dora to re-orchestrate their dance in a publicly meaningful manner and not mere noise. CSOs and aggrieved Zedizens should re-institute a proper legal process as what was challenged in the tribunal was not founded on reason. Let us not find individuals guilty because of our own warped reasoning.”

Is There Thought in What they Say?

2009-06-30T01:03:00.000-07:00

HH hypocrite - Ronnie (http://www.daily-mail.co.zm/media/news/viewnews.cgi?category=2&id=1246344383)

"GOVERNMENT says United Party for National Development (UPND) president Hakainde Hichilema has no moral right to call for a reduction in the size of Cabinet when his party has just increased the number of vice-presidents to four.Chief Government Spokesperson Lieutenant-General Ronnie Shikapwasha said in an interview in Lusaka yesterday that it is morally wrong for Mr Hichilema to ask Government to cut the size of Cabinet."

Surely, is there thought in what our politicians say? It is obvious that it is morally right for HH to question the size of Cabinet. Cabinet is a public cost, HH's party or pact is NOT. And this Lieutenant-General Ronnie Shikapwasha surely knows.

My plea to the Lieutenant-General is that he concerns himself with ensuring that the technocrats in government put in place infallable mechanisms for enforcing reductions in public resource wastage as evidenced by the hundreds of GRZ vehicles still clogging the roads after 5.00pm and at weekends. Could it be his, is still one of them? And Lieutenant-General Ronnie Shikapwasha, how come suddenly the number of vehicles without GRZ plates has increased at some ministries? I am sure the many Toyota hilux vans, I saw parked at a Government ministry on Government road are government vehicles!

HH was talking about public wastage, and he has the moral and citizen right to do so. Please let us not always politic for politics sake.

And, lastly, even our public media also seldom thinks before they write. The headline "Veep challenges PF/UPND alliance" should surely have read "MMD national trustee challenges PF/UPND alliance". (http://www.times.co.zm/news/viewnews.cgi?category=4&id=1246340091)

It is clear from the news article that George Kundu was on party duty and not government duty. He spoke as MMD national trustee. What I would have loved the media to tell us is whether he used government resources or party resources. Abuse of government resources for partisan political pursuits does not just happen during electoral periods. I always wonder where CSOs go in between elections!

Wage Strikes in Zambia: A Story of Going Nowhere

2009-06-29T07:27:00.000-07:00

We can not expect any change in livelihoods accruing from wage increments. The costs of social amenities in this country are dictated more by mere profiteering than "demand and supply" assumptions. These costs always change with rumours of wage increments!

Please allow me to digress.

There is always so much I want to write about in this backwater country of ours called Zambia. And mostly, it is because I long ceased to have respect for what many consider newsworth individuals or institutions. Critical and analytical thought is rather rare and may be that is why, as a country we are always arriving where we are supposed to have left.

I wrote many years ago that, if we do not change our ways, “When our children seek our footprints in the sands of history, they will arrive at only one conclusion. ‘We went nowhere'.” Frighteningly, this is becoming true. Least we forget, it is also apparent that we are the only generation that does not improve on the successes of preceeding generations.

The fact that we are not getting anywhere or that we are not improving on the circumstances of our great grand parents is chiefly because we do not want to be critical of our obtaining circumstances. It is a comfort zone, even if messy and smelly!

Sorry.

Wage strikes in Zambia always remind me of a friend that decided to rent a bar premises in Chilenje compound. The owner and landlord had enough of the competition around and the profits could not sustain his life style. Renting it out was a good option, so the story goes. I will call my friend, Mbinji and the landlord, Mufalo.

In October, Mbinji entered into a rental agreement of six months advance rent, and duly paid Mufalo the tenancy contract amount. Mbinji refurbished the place and appealed to a different patronage. In the first three months, Mbinji did not see Mufalo, and was happy that he did not have a nosey landlord. But, he heard that Mufalo had taken a new wife.

However, things took an expected turn in January. Mufalo suddenly appeared, and asked Mbinji if he could advance him some money. And I hear this is how the story went.

Mufalo: "BoMbinji, I can see you are doing very well. I hear the bar is always crowded. You see my wife wants us to move the children from Chilenje Primary to Nkwazi."

Mbinji: "That is nice. Nkwazi is very expensive, I just moved my children from there to Chilenje Primary School. I could no longer afford it."

Mufalo: "Well, I am sure you will send them back, now that you are doing fine. Actually, I came to ask for an advance payment on the rentals."

Well, I could continue with the narration, but the rest is known. Mbinji did not advance Mufalo the rentals, as he still had to recover his costs due to refurbishments. The bar closed, when the next rentals were due as Mufalo had decided to increase the rent by 50 percent. Mufalo did not get to send his children to Nkwazi. And his wife divorced him! Both Mbinji and Mufalo returned to where they were before.

The moral of this story is that monetary increases in our obtaining socio-economic environment do not always move persons from point A to B. In short, we can not expect any change in livelihoods accruing from wage increments.

From 1991 to today, we decided to dance with the devil we did not understand! Nearly, 18 years later, we still have not interrogated our dance, mostly because for the few it is havesting gold, and this is irrespective of whether one is in government, donor circuit, church or civil society. The individual benefits to be reaped are immense!

The rot that came with this country's shift from provision of social amenities to where the State allowed interested individuals to asssume State responsiblities is inarguably where the solution to our problems lie. We can not go anywahere if the State fails to provide or regulate housing, health, education, and transport. These amenities need regulation, with such regulation being direct or by State intervention through CONTINUED provision of equivalent services. And in this country, there was no continuation in quality and quantity!

Surely, how then can wage increments address the fact that costs of social amenities are dictated by factors most distant from the regulation of the State? A nurse, teacher in Lusaka seeks to send his or her child to a private school, and the private school owner always increases the schoo fees each year!

I have to close here, as I surely do not intend to write a dissertation on State Failure in Zambia. But we should always be cognisant of the fact that the proliferation of NGOs or CSOs in general is always indicative of the failure of the State to provide for its people.

What Tomorrow, We Will Not be Told

2009-06-24T13:10:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow (Thursday, June 25, 2009 AD) the media will be in a frenzy.
"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 free 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.

Finding witches and wizards

2009-06-24T00:46:00.000-07:00

Next week I stroll back to the University. I have been away from lecture rooms for six (6) months, and I must say whereas I miss the students, I do not at all miss the human support side of the Institution.

Sometimes, I dream of a University of Zambia empty of administrators. That surely will be a place to work in. It is tragic that public administrative structures in our poor nations often end up being the demotivational circumstances to one's otherwise enjoyable pursuits.

I love interacting with students. I love learning from students, as I am not the guardian of all knowledge. I am just a slightly brighter candle in a sea of beautiful candles. And I have always hoped many of my academic colleagues will accept this simple reality, as a means of making University education a journey beyond theories.

Just thinking of how the University of Zambia is managed, at Department, School, or whatever other level always sends a shiver through my body. Camaraderie is as alien as efficacy, efficiency and being relevant to obtaining future circustances. Finding witches and wizards, is the game that is always played. A pity. I wonder if I will be the found witch again.

Thinking of RB & Mmembe

2009-06-23T06:30:00.000-07:00

I wonder what RB will say tomorrow. I am thinking he will do a Mwanawasa 20% salary concession, and of course, play the Opposition game of expletives. But I also, wonder what Mmembe will write on Thursday, but I am thinking the headlines will be something to do with sacred cows, and lack of anti-corruption and civility in the incumbent presidency.

Paint Me a Picture - Depravity of power

2009-06-22T02:02:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, I saw a picture. It was of an elderly man bowing down before another man. I read that the man on his knees was a government Minister. The man before whom he bowed down was the President of this country I call home. Today, I read many arguing that in our tradition, there is nothing wrong with an elderly man bowing down before another. I also read many arguing that it is because of bootlicking that a Minister can bow down before a President. A President is not a chief or king, so the argument of tradition is a fallacy, the latter say.

Tomorrow, I asked an artist to paint me a picture of an elderly man kneeling before another. I took the picture to a group of children and asked them what they thought.

“That is Jesus, see he is praying before the lord,” says one.

“No. He must have done something wrong. He is now asking for forgiveness,” another says.

It is a beautiful picture, this picture of a government Minister kneeling before a President. Its meaning is as deep as the children eloquently understood the message conveyed by an elderly man kneeling before another. The beauty of the picture is that it shows the depravity of power.

Abysses of Reason

2009-06-19T02:47:00.000-07:00

It is either that the private media in Zambia always intends to misinform the public or is it that the media itself exists in an abyss of reason. Reading today's Post news stories (print and electorinic), which are in effect opinions of opposition party leaders of Edith Nawaki, Michael Sata, and the fellow from SACCORD, one wonders how it can be that a country can have such inanalytic people conceived as newsworthy. There is nothing informed or meaninful that any of these persons are communicating. In short, they remind one of the noise a dog whose tail has been trapped by the door makes.

It is simplistic and uttermost a manifestation of analytic insufficiency for Nawaki to shout that RB's re-appointment of Dora Siliya is ethnical! This does not help the public. The fundamental issue is simply that Dora Silya is NOT currently conceived to be publicly acceptable. Her behaviours in the Tribunal issues did not show any evidence of her being able to instil public confidence in her execution of public office. This is the bottom line, and this has meaning to the public and not the nonsense of tribalism, ethnicity, which is utter rubbish and cheap.

As for SACCORD, I wish CSOs can take time to analyse issues before opening their mouths. We do not need uninformed statements, as they can be construed informed by lesser informed members of society.

Lastly, I sincerely wonder whether being an opposition leader means that you have the licence to talk without basis. That is innuendo, speculation and allegations. Sata surely should simply tell us of this corruption knowledge that Dora has on Rupiah Banda, that way he will be helping us. And surely, why can't the media interrogate Sata for this knowledge? What value is there in simply reporting an innuendo or allegation without requesting that the person justifies himself or herself? Well, may be this country's journalism ethics belong to the pit latrine!

Analyse First

2009-06-18T11:59:00.000-07:00

Reading the CSO, in particular, Transparency Internationals, response to Judge Musonda's judgement on the Dora Siliya case, one is left with utter feelings of pity and a sense of melancholy. Judge Musonda used precendents to argue his case, the Tribunal did not cite a single precendent on their finding that Dora breached the constitution, how then can any analytic individual argue that the ruling is unfortunate. It is mere hogwash and crap for CSos to misrepresent facts. Judge Musonda should be upheld for his legal uprightness, and not be critised because of the mere winds of political and public discontentment. CSOs in Zambia should stop being euphoric and playing to the media spotlight.

Gosh.., analyse first and talk later!

A Disfigurement of Political Opportunities

2009-06-17T19:02:00.000-07:00

It is surely a historic feat that Rupiah Banda can pick a hammer and hit the nail closing his own coffin. It is frightening that a leader can re-appoint a publicily (not legally) unaccepted person.

The Dora Siliya re-appointment is amidst overwhelming public discontent with Rupiah Banda's leadership, and it surely is evidential of unfounded political arrogance. I will not be surprised if Dora Siliya does not receive the expected management support that is normally provided to a minister. Her performance, will as a result be constrained.

This is a time when the few good men left in our political governance institution of cabinet should show their moral mantle(if they do), by stepping down in disagreement with this one act of political foolery and arrogance.

This incident is purely a disfigurement of one's political opportunities to change a frightening negative political perception as a leader. The question that begs to be answered and now left to innuendo and speculation is - Whose interests is Rupiah Banda really serving?

Dora Siliya, Legality & Legitimacy: A Question of Political Acceptability

2009-06-17T11:34:00.000-07:00

The inalienable premise of political acceptability or correctedness is that there is a difference between what is legal and what is legitimate.

Dora Siliya does not have any legitimacy to ascend back into political office simply because her political acceptableness is non-existent. This is despite the fact that Judge Musonda eloquently argued that Siliya is absolved of the misrepresentation of breach of the constitution. There is no denying the fact that legally she is a free person.

But it should be undoubted that being legally absolved of a misrepresented breach of the constitution, does not absolve one of his or her political unacceptedness. It is a folly of the incumbent president, Rupiah Banda, to re-appoint a person who in the political perceptions of the majority of Zambians has no moral legitimacy to hold political office again.

In any case, I consistently argued that the Tribunal did misrepresent the interpretation of the Attorney General's legal advice, but this is not to say I absolved her of any perceived wrong doings. For instance, I find it had to have trust in a public individual that can transact publicly in her car and at a filling station!

Her suitability for public office was brought in question, not simply by her ignoring the AGs advice, but by the manner in which she conducted public affairs. And this, I had hoped the president and his advisors would understand. But, it is clear it is futile to believe our leaders will understand that legal decisions are seldom in line with political legitimacy or acceptability.

It really amazes me what African leaders think. A tragedy.

The dodo and the dodos

2009-06-10T23:14:00.000-07:00

I am starting the day stressed. Really not understanding why Zedizens are now so prone to believing falsehoods. Did not sleep well, as I kept wondering how an educated group could not understand the difference between a lie and a truth. It is simply a question of "a lie repeated so often becomes a truth". Our current intellectual space has been reduced to one of innuendos and speculations. Arguing from a knowledge point of view is deemed, partisan or suspect! Utter rubbish.

It is tragic. The average person I work-related interact with is neither desperate nor hungry. It actually is the subject of the work that is mostly desperate or hungry. Yet, the intellect of these diametric opposites is the most distant from dialectic inquiry. In short, the dodo and the dodos are the same.

At Kilimanjaro

2009-06-10T03:17:00.001-07:00

Its another day, sitting having coffee at Kili. The discussion topics are typical. The Post, Sata, HH, RB, and wherein to draw the line as to who is communicating facts or opinion. The bottomline is slowly, I am believing it does not matter anymore as Zedizens are not ready to exist in the future.

An understanding of our present socio-political and economic circumstances, I have consistently argued should be premised on what future as a people we seek to live in today. An understanding which unfortunately is not acknowledged or even debated. Instead we waste time debating nonsensical issues of presidential candidates as if presidents are the future.

More later...