Work hard, Rupiah urges ministers Work hard, Rupiah urges ministers

Work hard, Rupiah urges ministers Work hard, Rupiah urges ministers
Written by Noel Sichalwe

PRESIDENT Rupiah Banda yesterday urged ministers to work hard and deliver the promises that were made to the Zambians during the campaigns for the just-ended elections.

Swearing in six Cabinet and deputy ministers at State House, President Banda said that government should work as a team in order to deliver.

"I just want to say thank you very much for this occasion where I have sworn in our ministers and even our Vice-President this morning. All of you are well known to me. We are friends and we have worked together when I was Vice-President," he said.

"I have no doubt that you constitute a good team together with those that have not been sworn in and that we will work together and you shall be able to fulfil what you have said in your oath. I hope we will be able to deliver to the people of Zambia the promises that we made in our recent elections."

Among those that were sworn in was Vice-President George Kunda, finance minister Dr Situmbeko Musokotwane, sports minister Kenneth Chipungu, local government minister Ben Tetamashimba, mines minister Maxwell Mwale and labour minister Austin Liato.

Others were deputy ministers Chileshe Kapwepwe for finance, Christopher Kalila for sports, Moses Mwangala for environment and provincial ministers Isaac Mwanza for Eastern Province and Joseph Mulyata for North Western Province.

President Banda was confident that they would work as a winning team.

In an interview, Kapwepwe said she was honoured by the appointment, which she did not expect.

She said that this could be the come-back of the Kapwepwe family into Zambian politics just like her father had dedicated his life to serving the Zambian people.

Kapwepwe could, however, not be optimistic that the appointment was a launch of her political career, saying it was too early to predict.

"I am a nominated member of parliament and deputy minister now and definitely I will be noticeable in politics. I wasn't expecting it but it is indeed a great honour and I am ready to meet the challenges," said Kapwepwe.

Dr Musokotwane said he intended to raise revenue through Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) by creating a conducive environment for investors.

Dr Musokotwane said despite the current global economic crisis, there were a lot of people that had money willing to invest in some countries like Zambia.

"These people have lots of money and they are looking for places where they can invest," he said. "We are lucky that ours is a small economy. So out of the trillions circulating around, if we can woo about US $4 billion for out economy, that will be a great boost," he said

He said his challenge was to mobilise enough money from FDI. Dr Musokotwane said they would be talking to donors as a country because some of the problems that Africa was facing were lumped together with war-torn countries.

“We will also keep talking to our local people here and give them confidence to invest their money in their own country. So by making it easy for people to invest, is the way we can attract investment in the country,” said Dr Musokotwane.