Fighting corruption is not an easy undertaking

Fighting corruption is not an easy undertaking
Written by Editor

It is said that the most difficult, most important fight that anyone with power faces is the fight against himself, the struggle for self control. That may be one of the toughest ones. We say this because there is corruption made possible by power. It is not easy to fight against corruption and even against the abuse of one’s prerogatives.

One has to have a very well-trained, strong conscience, a great deal of awareness, because we have seen people become full of themselves and use power in the wrong way: the tendency towards the use of power in the wrong way is something one has to be in constant watch for. Fighting corruption is not an easy undertaking for anyone. It is actually a life and death struggle.

Generally speaking, the principle on which people who take part in such struggles base their activities on the fact that this is a battle for life or death. This is so because corrupt people will defend their corruption, their loot with everything at their disposal. They will even use corruption itself to defend their corrupt activities and the benefits therefrom. So if you are not capable of defending yourself, your cause is lost and you have to pay with your life. This for us has been very clear from day one, from the first step we took in fighting corruption in this country.

Fortunately, we didn’t have to fight against fanatics with clear ideals, or fanatics for a cause. We had the privilege of fighting against people, men motivated by ambitions of the material nature, ambitions of an economic nature, and of a social and political nature. If it was fanatics we were fighting against, we wouldn’t be alive today – we would have never escaped without being killed. Nevertheless, the people we have been fighting can today clearly see that their game is over, or is almost over and they are throwing in everything to try and escape convictions, going to jail. This is understandable.

Ever since Levy Mwanawasa went to Parliament to ask for the removal of Frederick Chiluba’s immunity from prosecution, we have been subjected to all sorts of accusations, insinuations and anonymous propaganda circulated and posted on the internet. We know very well the source of all that dirt, of all that filth, of all that propaganda and lies. It is from these same people, their friends, relatives and supporters. And their aim has been clear: to malign us in the hope that this will diminish our credibility, and after silencing us, nobody will push further for their prosecution.

Sometimes they have even turned very good people against us through lies and calumny. Who has forgotten what they tried to do with the late director of public prosecutions Mukelabai Mukelabai? All sorts of crooks, corrupt elements tried to come in and defend what was clearly wrong, or if not wrong, highly questionable. The corrupt elements, those who were facing corruption charges in our courts of law, jumped in as the defenders of justice. We don’t want to dwell much on this issue but one thing that cannot be denied is that these characters were defending themselves and not anything else.

We also witnessed similar behaviour over the attempt to free Kashiwa Bulaya from prosecution through a nolle prosequi. We vigorously opposed that move. But we saw very good people coming to the defence of Bulaya and those who were trying to corruptly grant him a nolle. We actually fought a lone battle. However, eventually our people started to see sense in what we were saying and joined in the fight. This forced Levy to back down and allow Bulaya to be prosecuted. Bulaya is today in jail for corruption.

In all this, we had to encounter serious opposition, outright malice and unbridled hatred from George Kunda, who was then justice minister and Attorney General. And it was this same George who was at the centre of all this confusion.

It cannot be denied that George has tried everything to derail these corruption cases. George cannot deny that even Levy blasted him over his attempts to disband the Task Force and completely put an end to the corruption cases. Levy had to take this matter to cabinet in an attempt to put an end to George’s evil intentions. We challenge George to deny this. George has not been on the side of those fighting corruption. He has in fact been leading a consistent and relentless battle to undermine those who have been fighting corruption in this country. And this puts George in good light with the corrupt.

And for this reason, we have been arch enemies of George. He hates us with a passion. And he has extended that to everyone connected to us or even believed to be sympathetic to us.

It therefore does not surprise us that George today can entertain a petition by questionable characters whose political connections to those facing corruption charges in our courts of law today are well known. But this same George did everything possible to defend Dora Siliya from allegations of abuse of office that were levelled against her by so many people, so many decent people and institutions. George has even defended Dora’s stay in office while a tribunal constituted by the Chief Justice of Zambia is sitting to probe allegations against her arising from her conduct in the same ministry in which she is still being kept as minister. But George was yesterday very quick to welcome a petition from unscrupulous elements to remove Mutembo Nchito from being prosecutor of the on-going corruption cases that are about to come to an end.

Again, we are not surprised that even on the day on which Lt Gen Geojago Musengule and his friend Amon Sibande were being sent to jail for corruption as a result of Mutembo’s relentless, effective, efficient and orderly prosecution, George was busy defaming Mutembo.

George’s behaviour yesterday is very similar to the way he behaved in 2005 when he failed to convince the public that he had a good reason for stopping the prosecution of Bulaya through a shameless nolle prosequi. At that time, he resorted to accusing Mutembo of having breached the Republican Constitution for refusing to participate in his evil scheme. George went so far as to mislead his boss Levy who encouraged LAZ to discipline Mutembo and use that as pretext for removing him from the prosecution of corruption cases.

No one can deny that Mutembo has accounted for himself very well on these cases. His record of successful prosecutions of these corruption cases stands at almost 100 per cent. And through Mutembo’s work, the prosecution of corruption in this country has been pushed to another level, precedence has been set. And Mutembo’s work is today benefitting institutions like the Anti-Corruption Commission. Mutembo has learnt something from his work and his lessons have also been learnt by the ACC. And today, we are all witnessing some very high levels of performance in terms of investigations and prosecutions by the ACC. This means nothing to George because all that matters to him is himself. We have never seen such a petty-minded person like George.

But we want to let George and his friends know which we have no reason to defend Mutembo. His innocence is enough. If Mutembo has taken even one ngwee, one cent that is not his due, we are sure he is prepared to pay the price. We know that he will not want to be treated differently for any reason. Like all of us, if Mutembo has stolen any money, he deserves worse punishment than an ordinary person. We say this because we all know very well the evils of corruption from our work and because we know we deserve much harsher punishment. But we say with full confidence because we know that unlike them, we cannot do such things.

And it is surprising that this same government which the other week issued a statement announcing that they have commenced investigations on the affairs of Zambian Airways and everyone will be accorded the full presumption of innocence until proved guilty, its Vice-President, its minister of justice is accusing Mutembo of stealing and racketeering. If this is the case, why waste the time of the police, Drug Enforcement Commission and ACC officers in unnecessary investigations? Why doesn’t George just frame up the charges and take the matter to court and avoid costly and unnecessary investigations? This brings into question what type of investigations the Zambian people should expect from the team that has been tasked to do so by the government. We say this because the other day, it was George’s boss, Rupiah Banda, behaving in the same manner and making similar statements.

Will these characters accept findings from the investigators that contradict their publicly stated positions on this matter? It seems that George and his friends have decided that the easiest way to tarnish Mutembo is to lie and suggest that he has stolen. It is however very strange that as they make these accusations, they have not even suggested that one ngwee was taken by Mutembo. And where are the banks whose money Mutembo has stolen? Why are they not saying anything? Why are they not prosecuting him for stealing their money? So far, it’s only the National Airports Corporation that has brought up a civil case against Zambian Airways, and not Mutembo, for unsettled debts.

Are these people so desperate that they want to brand people who manage companies that owe money as criminals? Is this what they want the country to be? It is clear that George and his friends are not interested in the truth at all. If they were, they would ask themselves a very simple question which would end this whole debate. That question is: how much did Mutembo put in his pocket from the money borrowed or earned by Zambian Airways? If they can point at something in this direction, then their case against Mutembo will be very simple, it will be closed within a day. We ask this question because we know for a fact that although Mutembo worked very hard and pushed to ensure that the company succeeded, he was not greedy for money. Mutembo had an employment contract with Zambian Airways but not even one day did he draw a ngwee or a cent from the salary given to him in that contract. His concern was always that Zambian Airways needs every ngwee or cent for its operations and when the time is ripe, he will draw his salary. This is the type of integrity and care that the likes of George cannot understand. They don’t believe that one can mobilise such huge amounts of money to finance the operations of a company and put nothing in his pocket from it. This was the kind of sacrifice that kept Zambian Airways going. At Zambian Airways, no director was ever paid a sitting allowance as it’s done in other companies. And no director got free tickets from the airline. Would those today insulting us, if they were in our position, have done what we did? The airline business is not a cheap business. It deals in huge amounts of money, in millions of dollars on every front. Going around and banding these millions as if the business concerned was a kantemba is not only malicious but an exhibition of very high levels of ignorance about the nature of the business they are talking about. It doesn’t take time for an airline to gobble millions of dollars. That is the nature of the business.

Last year when economic figures for 2007 were released, we were told that aviation had contributed significantly to the growth of our GDP. Which aviation were they talking about? Wasn’t it Zambian Airways? How do they think this growth was achieved? Do they think it was achieved without investing money?

We will never deny that there were difficulties in running Zambian Airways and these difficulties have today led to the suspension of operations of this airline. But we can say with utmost sincerity, with all the honesty in the world that the problems Zambian Airways faces today are not as a result of dishonest dealings on the part of its employees, directors and shareholders. It was simply a difficult business. And mistakes might have been made, and indeed were made, but honest ones and not crooked deals.

It is for this reason that we welcome any investigations into the affairs of Zambian Airways. And these investigations can come from any quarter – and that’s not an issue with us. All that we hope for is that every investigation that will be carried on Zambian Airways should be an honest one. If Mutembo, or any of us for that matter that were associated with Zambian Airways, have stolen a ngwee or a cent from anyone, we should be dealt with. But to call for the removal of Mutembo without showing that he has taken any money contrary to the allegations being made is to play cheap politics and to deliberately aid the cause of those who have robbed this country of millions and billions and deliberately save them from going to jail. And this is why today those closely connected to those who are being prosecuted for corruption are in the forefront seeking the assistance of their friend George to terminate Mutembo’s duties to the nation as a state prosecutor.

About 10 days ago, we told the nation that plans were afoot to arrest Fred M’membe and Mutembo to cripple The Post and stop the corruption prosecutions that are currently going on in our courts of law. The past week’s activities by Rupiah and George have confirmed what we had been saying.