Maravi

LETTERS - Parastatals, Constitution

Auditor General’s report
By M. Muchende Lusaka
Thursday June 21, 2007 [04:00]

The Auditor General’s report on parastatal companies for 2005 is an interesting attempt to inform the nation about the state of government investments. It is clear from the reports that the parastatal companies are trying their best to stay above waters despite the difficulties they have to contend with against the new companies.

However, the structure of the reports makes me highly uncomfortable as to the intended use of the outcome given that the shareholder is government. I would have no qualms releasing the reports of public or non-market institutions via the website.

However, the real achievement of the Auditor General has been to kill these institutions that are struggling to correct the past wrongs and uncompetitive business climate of the 1990s.

It is even worse for those institutions whose reports have been released without responses from management. The fortunate ones such as Zamtel and the National Airports Corporations had responses from management but others did not have this opportunity. Should we say the reports are basically speculative or in draft form?
It is not enough to release the reports without getting reports from the other side, otherwise wrong conclusions will be made. Worse still, this is not helpful information to decision makers and will only arm the private sector that is aggressively taking away business from the parastatal companies.

Could this approach of releasing draft reports be the reason for the recent conflict between Mrs Anna Chifungula and Dr Simon Miti? It is also true that most of these companies are audited by professional auditing firms and nothing has been published regarding their solvency. What is the problem then?

Could it be that the Auditor General’s office is using the civil service approach to audit business transactions for profit-making entities? Or is it that the Auditor General is untouchable and can go lengths releasing reports without due regard to their impact? I am interested to have answers to my questions.




http://www.postzambia.com/post-read_article.php?articleId=28067

Educate masses on constitution-making process
By Sepiso Lilami,
Wednesday June 20, 2007 [04:00]

I would like to add a voice to the ongoing debate and fight over the mode of adopting the new draft constitution.

Most important, I would like to observe with sadness that the debate and fight over the method to be used in adopting the draft constitution is literally between Levy, his few arrogant and blind-following ministers against the Oasis Forum and the opposition top leaders who understand the constitution-making process well.

This is supposed to be a national issue in which all the citizens of Zambia need to actively get involved.

Unfortunately, if you go to the grassroots or general citizenry, the level of involvement in the fight for enacting the new constitution is very low.

The reason is very simple; most of the general citizenry of Zambia do not understand the process of adopting the new constitution and the appropriate mode to be used if the nation is to have a people-driven constitution that will stand a test of time as opposed to having a new constitution every decade (this has been the case in Zambia since we got independence).

The reason Levy is adamant and wants the constitution-making process to be done his own way, as and when he wants is he knows that possibly 99 per cent of the population of Zambia is ignorant about the constitution-making process. This is why he is insisting on a mode that will be easy for him to swindle the Zambian people out of a good constitution by taking advantage of their ignorance on matters of constitution-making process.

I therefore want to appeal to the Oasis Forum, the civil society, the opposition leaders and the private media to get to the masses throughout the country and educate the citizens on issues like:
What is a constitution-making process?

What is a constituent assembly and what is its role in the constitution making process? What are the advantages and disadvantages of adopting the constitution through a constituent assembly?

What is a referendum and its role in the constitution-making process? What is the importance of having a new constitution as soon as possible or at least before the next general elections?
If these and many other issues are explained to the citizens of Zambia, then it will be easy for the Zambians to be united and join calls by the Oasis Forum to wear red ribbons and probably honk at 17: 00 hours everyday to show solidarity for a people-driven constitution.

The nation needs to be as united as it was during the third term debate.

Levy needs to feel the pressure coming from the whole nation, not only from a few learned colleagues who are privileged to understand national issues. Otherwise the fight for a people-driven constitution will take long to be realised.

Once more I would like to remind the Zambian people that the President and his government are currently taking advantage of the ignorance of the majority Zambians
over the constitution making process.

Labels: AUDITOR GENERAL, CONSTITUTION, LETTERS

posted by MrK @ 3:43 AM