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Zambians celebrate corrupt people as heroes – Chigunta

Zambians celebrate corrupt people as heroes – Chigunta
By Chibaula Silwamba
Thu 19 Nov. 2009, 04:00 CAT

ZAMBIANS today celebrate corrupt people as heroes, President Rupiah Banda’s chief policy analyst Dr Francis Chigunta has said.

During the launch of Transparency International’s Corruption Perception Index (CPI) 2009 at Chrismar Hotel in Lusaka on Tuesday, Dr Chinguta expressed displeasure that the anti-graft body had attributed Zambia’s slight improvement in the CPI ranking to the late president Levy Mwanawasa ignoring the efforts that President Rupiah Banda had put in place to fight corruption since he came to office.

“As Mr Emmanuel Mwamba said, you are quoting documents which were produced in the year 2008 and you attribute all that to the late president. Please! Let’s appreciate that much has been done during the short period that President Banda has been office,” Dr Chigunta said. “In any case, the fight against corruption should not only be attributed to one individual or government. It’s about the whole society. It’s about re-examining our values as Zambians. Zambians today celebrate corrupt people as heroes. But we should discourage that type of practice and attitude which defeats the whole purpose of fighting corruption.”

Dr Chigunta, who was visibly annoyed, accused TI of deliberately portraying a picture that President Banda was doing nothing to fight corruption.

“I am disturbed, first of all by the narrative in TIZ board treasurer Mr Sampa Kabungu’s address which is contradictory, misleading and deliberately biased to create the impression that under the current President nothing has been done. Indeed all the praise, the gains should be attributed to the late president Levy Mwanawasa,” Dr Chigunta said.

“Just as you are trying to show that these gains can be attributed to the late president, you should also make a serious attempt to show that the current major corruption scandals also emerged or were perpetuated under the late president.”
He said most of the corruption people were talking about happened during the Mwanawasa administration, not now.

“There is a history to all these scandals,” Dr Chigunta said. “Indeed you need to celebrate in a narrative, in your language the achievements that President Banda has achieved in terms of institutionalising the fight against corruption. It’s only under Banda that we have had this serious attempt to institutionalise the fight against corruption. We have ratified international standards and codes on the fight against corruption. We have introduced the policy against corruption.

“President Banda has made major reforms including in the area of procurement but that is not celebrated. A serious attempt, deliberate, manipulative is being made to attribute everything to the past.”
He dismissed the findings of CPI.

“The CPI is narrowly based on the minds of business people or some so-called analysts who may themselves be highly subjective. If you approach a businessman who could not get a contract from government, do you expect that businessman to praise government? Certainly not!” Dr Chigunta said.

“You have also to take into account the levels of polarisation in the country. For example in Zambia today, some people may hold views that are absolutely anti-government and you may interview these people including foreigners that are resident here. They may not hold good views but you are going to collect their views and produce them in the form of this CPI. I don’t know what your organisation is doing to try and counter this inherent biasness in your methodology.”

Dr Chigunta said the CPI was not reflective of what was obtaining because it was based on perception that could be subjective.

“… As you have tried to portray as based on valid scientific findings, I have some problems with that as a social scientist. A pig is a pig no matter whether you apply lipstick on it. A perception is a perception no matter what you attempt to do,” said Dr Chigunta.

But TIZ executive director Goodwell Lungu justified the findings of the CPI and advised Dr Chigunta not to be emotional.

Lungu explained that the CPI included data for the last two years of the late Mwanawasa but did not cover the period in which President Banda has been in office.

Lungu expressed surprised that Chigunta was upset over the report which acknowledged president Mwanawasa’s efforts in the fight against corruption and yet President Banda was part of that administration as vice-president at the time.

Labels: CORRUPTION, CPI, FRANCIS CHIGUNTA, GOODWELL LUNGU, TIZ

posted by MrK @ 1:34 PM