Maravi

It’s them, not us playing politics

It’s them, not us playing politics
Written by Editor

The Post will never defend wrongdoings from anyone, including its own directors and shareholders or employees and friends.The Post has never hesitated to expose and denounce the wrongdoings of those associated with it, be they its shareholders or directors or indeed even its own employees. The Post has exposed and denounced the wrongdoings of its own very dear friends.

And if indeed there is any wrongdoing in the conduct of the affairs of Zambian Airways and in the airline’s dealings, The Post will not defend that. At no point has The Post attempted or tried to stop or frustrate the investigations that the government ordered the police or the Drug Enforcement Commission to institute against the airline, its directors, shareholders or employees.

It is government officials, especially the Minister of Transport and Communications, Dora Siliya, who have consistently and persistently been accusing The Post of wrongdoing with regard to its investment in Zambian Airways. It is those connected with this government that have been publishing articles claiming this and that about Zambian Airways and insinuating that The Post has done something wrong with its investment in this airline. What do they expect the shareholders, directors and employees of The Post to do? How do they expect them to respond to all this?

The Post never sent its shareholders, directors or employees to do wrong on its behalf. And if there are any allegations or insinuations that wrong things have been done on behalf or in the name of The Post, the company has the right and is duty-bound to commence investigations and establish the truth about those allegations. The Post was created to do the right things and not to engage in corrupt activities.

Surprisingly, those who claim to seek justice through investigations by the police and other law enforcement agencies are the ones who are everyday issuing statements, publishing articles full of allegations and insinuations on Zambian Airways and The Post. It is not The Post doing so. The Post is merely responding, and legitimately so, to their allegations and insinuations.

There is nothing under the laws of this country that stops The Post from calling on anybody they so wish to probe the affairs of a company in which they are investors and of which they are creditors to establish the truth about the allegations and insinuations being raised.

It is not true that it is only the Zambia Institute of Chartered Accountants (ZICA) that was allowed to conduct a forensic audit on Zambian Airways. There are many accounting firms in this country that are members of ZICA that the public can use to conduct statutory audits and carry out any financial investigation they desire. We have every right under the laws of this country to contract Grant Thornton, KPMG, PriceWaterHouse or any other accounting firm to investigate on our behalf the affairs of Zambian Airways.

And no one can stop us from doing so. Not even ZICA can stop us from doing so. And us commencing such investigations does not in any way interfere with the investigations of any law enforcement agency. And these are competent institutions to carry out such work on our behalf. If for any reason ZICA feels inhibited to carry out the investigations that they have accepted to do, we will not hesitate to contract an accounting firm to do that on our behalf.

And equally, there is no law in this country that stops us from engaging a law firm to investigate on our behalf as to whether or not the laws of this country were in any way breached by Zambian Airways, its directors or employees in the conduct of the airline’s business. This also does not in any way stop, or interfere with, the law enforcement agencies’ work.

If at the end of the day, something illegal, something corrupt was done by Zambian Airways, its directors or employees, let the law take its course. The only thing we can say is that those who have been accused of having done wrong things should receive fair treatment and trial.

The state should have the right to punish criminal acts, but the rules and procedures by which the state enforces its laws must be explicit, not secret, arbitrary or subject to political manipulation by those in power.

Truly, no one should be above the law but under no circumstances should those in government be allowed to impose inequalities in the administration of the law; the state should be required to deal evenly and equally with all its people.

This is not the case. Those in power are not treating us in this way. They are actually using the state institutions under their control to harass us, to insinuate and make all sorts of allegations against us. The Times of Zambia is every day full of stories of those accusing us and insinuating that we have done wrong things.

Not even one day did the Times of Zambia or Zambia Daily Mail carry any story or comment by those defending us. And invariably, all the accusations and insinuations against us are coming from those in government or connected to government. Isn’t this an abuse of government institutions? Isn’t this corruption? How are we expected to respond to all this? Don’t we have the right to clear our names? Don’t we also have the right to be heard?

If Mutembo Nchito did anything wrong, as it is being alleged in the Times of Zambia of yesterday, let the law enforcement agencies bring this out, frame the necessary charges under the relevant law that he has violated and proceed from there.

Is this the right way for the government – that is supposed to represent everybody – to behave?

It is this behaviour that calls into question the integrity of the government itself and its work. It is this behaviour that makes it difficult for anyone to believe those under their control can carry out fair and objective investigations on or about Zambian Airways. It is very clear that for those in government, their desire is to fix or nail The Post or Mutembo to the cross. And it is also clear that they are trying to manipulate everything under their control and in their way to achieve this objective. This is what we are uncomfortable with and not necessarily being investigated. We have no fear of being investigated whatsoever because we know very well that there is nothing wrong we have done. And no one at The Post has said no investigations should be carried out on the affairs of Zambian Airways. This would be a contradiction, because as shareholders and creditors of Zambian Airways, we want to know how the affairs of that airline were conducted because we put in our money and would not like anyone to steal it or unjustifiably squander it. The Post has invested over K16.5 billion of its own money in Zambia Airways and there is no way the shareholders of The Post would allow that money to be lost without justification. If this money has been stolen or misused by any director or employee of Zambian Airways, the shareholders of The Post and indeed the employees of The Post would want that person prosecuted. And to do so, we need accurate information free from political bias and manipulation to conclusively establish such wrongdoing.

There is no one who can deny the fact that Rupiah Banda and his friends have highly politicised this issue. This is a fact that even ZICA recognises and acknowledges. And this needs to be addressed if the affairs of Zambian Airways have to be probed by state agencies in a manner that will not only be fair and just but will be seen to be so by those affected and all our people.

It is in this regard that we called for the maximum transparency and the broadest participation in the investigations of the affairs of Zambian Airways. Those who want to evade justice or being called upon to account for what they did can never invite ZICA, the Law Association of Zambia, the Bankers Association of Zambia, Transparency International Zambia and a myriad of other institutions to probe the affairs of Zambian Airways.

We know already the pressure that Rupiah’s people are already putting on some of the officials of ZICA after they wrote us letters accepting to conduct a forensic audit of the affairs of Zambian Airways. They are trying very hard to make ZICA U-turn on its decision or to moderate its involvement in this matter. Well, we don’t have the powers and influence they have over many people. If tomorrow we were to wake up and find that ZICA had reversed its decision, we will have no choice but to appoint an accounting firm, at a high cost to ourselves, to conduct that work on behalf of the shareholders of The Post. After all, it is these same firms, these same accountants that ZICA will use if they decide to carry on with the job. And moreover, it is these same accounting firms that carry out the audits of companies and other institutions that all of us rely on. They are required by law to be truthful and they are accountable to the public at large that rely on their reports.

We have no interests, as shareholders in Zambian Airways, to politicise this issue. If in any way we appear to be political over this issue, it is simply because we are responding to something that has been highly politicised by Rupiah and his friends. Zambians have not forgotten that it was Rupiah’s press aide Dickson Jere and Dora who made the issue of Zambian Airways a political matter in last October’s presidential election. So there is no way today they can turn around and accuse us of making the issue political when it is they themselves who introduced this issue in the political arena and tried very hard to make political capital out of it. And we have the right to take every measure, political or otherwise, to defend ourselves from being unjustly maligned and criminalised. We know that with their money, they can corrupt many people, they can buy even some souls, but they will not be able to corrupt everyone and buy every soul in this country. We therefore call for the fullest, the most transparent and broadest investigations of these allegations and insinuations against us which they themselves have so highly politicised. As things stand today, this issue is not a common or ordinary criminal allegation. It is a highly political matter which they themselves have created and are no longer comfortable with the politics they have to bear on it but don’t know what to do because it is now adversely hitting them.

Labels: CORRUPTION, DEC, THE POST, ZAMBIAN AIRWAYS

posted by MrK @ 8:40 AM