LETTERS - Energy, Judges, The World Bank
Zambia can solve its energy crisisBy Kaping'a Smogy Isaac Lusaka
Wednesday March 12, 2008 [03:00]
The article which appeared in your paper of Monday March 10, 2008 in which the government was blaming the World Bank and loading the consequences on its wagon for having misled the country on the energy crisis made very sad reading.
I can’t believe that after about 44 years of political independence, and having dealt with the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for many years, we still seem not to know and understand the dealings and policies of the two financial institutions.
Zambia, a very peaceful and beautiful nation endowed with plenty of rivers and falls, is capable of solving the energy chaos given the educated and trained human resource the country has.
As a sovereign state, we were supposed to be making our own independent and viable decisions which suit our own setup rather than be “yes bwanas” to bad foreign policies. I am not saying that all foreign policies are bad but we should be very selective.
My humble plea to the powers that be is: let us engage the right and qualified technocrats at all levels of our governance system so that they can advise the government accordingly, and to avoid mediocrity.
http://www.postzambia.com/post-read_article.php?articleId=38927
De-linking judiciary
By Kombe Ngolwe.
Wednesday March 12, 2008 [03:00]
The recent announcement of the de-linking the Judiciary from the executive arm of government is a step in the right direction if Zambia is really serious about democratic governance.
I applaud the government for this initiative.
However,Zambians need to ask questions and demand accountability on why and how long Zambians been living under the executive judiciary. This touches the confidence that the general public put in the court system. Without a distinct separate judiciary, people will question their guarantee for a fair and impartial hearing; and protection of the law.
Without a separate and independent judiciary, it would be very difficulty to avoid public accusations and labeling some trials as being politically motivated. A separate judiciary will ensure that justice is rendered in accordance with oath of office of judges and magistrates; and not according to the interests of any political party.
The only way to serve the best interests of Zambians is to effectively implement checks and balances in government by maintaining a distinct separation of those who legislate, execute and decide on laws. Democratic the governance too follows the principle of division of labour.
It is good that this issue comes this moment of constitution making. The best safeguard to avoid this overstep to executive judiciary is make a constitutional amendment now that will make it illegal and extremely difficulty for future executive powers to grab the judiciary in Zambia to serve their political appetites. Mere pronnouncement of de-linking the practice is not enough; make a constitutional law to protect it.
My hope is that this de-linking process of the judiciary will eventually lead to the real separation and independence of the judiciary in Zambia. The only link that needs to be maintained is funding for the judiciary and those Executive privileges as mandated by the Constitution.
http://www.postzambia.com/post-read_article.php?articleId=38925
World Bank, energy sector
By Kaliza Nyoni UNZA student
Wednesday March 12, 2008 [03:00]
I wish to contribute to the subject on the energy crisis which the permanent secretary Peter Mumba attributed to the wrong advice the World Bank gave to Zambia.
The World Bank is a bank from which many developing countries do borrow in order to finance their developmental projects.
However, when a country borrows, the bank attaches conditions that have to be met for a country to be given the money. Among these conditions are privatisation, restructuring, reducing inflation rate, reducing government budget deficits and cutting government expenditure, devaluation of local currency and many others. Restructuring also includes the energy sector.
Your editorial of 10th March, 2008 stated that the reliance of our government on the World Bank, the IMF and other donors to run the country is frightening. I wish to say that for a country to borrow from the World Bank, these conditions have to be met. Maybe this is why the PS attributed the energy crisis to the World Bank. Zambia had 280 public companies which have been privatised, with only a few remaining;
the sale of Zanaco was just one requirement which the World Bank demanded. We all know that the introduction of multiparty democracy in Zambia was one of the requirements that the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank advised Dr Kaunda's regime to allow in order to receive funding from these two financial institutions after our economy had almost collapsed with inflation standing at 200 per cent. The World Bank has to approve some developing countries’ national budgets, thus compromising sovereignty of these nations.
The developmental plans are made in Europe and are not compatible to our situation here. In most cases, they have reaped bitter results. But why should a country like ours borrow. Even in our own national budgets, there is a percentage for donor funding.
When you borrow, you are almost like a slave. Even the so-called HIPC and debt write-off is just one way by which the IMF and World Bank wants to reap our resources. Not all debt under HIPC has been written off, but that it has been spread over to be paid in a longer period. The question is: do we have our own enough resources?
Let’s see if developing countries can organise local resources to finance their development plans without IMF and World Bank. If Zimbabwe will manage to do it without IMF, World Bank and donor agencies in her current state with inflation over 10,000 per cent, then other developing countries can copy from her.
posted by MrK @ 6:12 AM
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