Maravi

‘Service above self’

‘Service above self’
By Editor
Mon 18 Jan. 2010, 04:01 CAT

Political leadership is very important in any country’s life.
Countries with good political leadership have made much progress even with very limited resources and under very difficult conditions.

We agree with Mulenga Chibamba, the author of Service Above Self, that Africa today remains poor because the continent lacks leadership dedicated to the service of their peoples and countries. And Chibamba is right in his observations that most African leaders are not prepared to do everything in their power to serve the interest of their people. Truly, the retrogression that we are today experiencing is as a result of lack of leadership in most of our countries. And it cannot also be denied that the accelerated progress that was made in our countries immediately after independence was as a result of the commitment and dedication of the political leadership of that time.

And for Zambia, one can accuse, and rightly so, Dr Kenneth Kaunda of having made many mistakes as the leader of our country but one can never correctly accuse him of lack of commitment and dedication to his people and his country. The achievements that we recorded as a nation can be directly attributed to the fact that Dr Kaunda and his comrades served their people and their country with sufficient honour and integrity. There was an unquestionably very high degree of personal commitment and dedication towards the service of their people and country. And the progress they made is a testimony of what can be done when there is honesty, dedication and integrity in a country’s political leadership. They didn’t have much knowledge about how to run a country, about economics and other things, but they had abundant commitment and dedication to their people and served their country with almost absolute honesty.

They were not in power to fulfill personal ambitions, to make themselves and their families rich. Dr Kaunda is a poor man and his wealth can fit in the four pockets of his safari suit shirt. And all the little he has can be accounted for without any difficulty. Dr Kaunda has no houses and the only property he has is that which the Zambian people have given him. But can the same be said about those who followed him? Look at how much wealth Frederick Chiluba amassed in 10 years as compared to the 27 years of Dr Kaunda’s rule! And it’s not surprising that Chiluba has been found by the courts of law to be a thief, to have stolen millions of dollars from his people. Instead of being concerned about the poor Zambian children who are moving naked and without even patapata on their feet, Chiluba was spending millions of taxpayers’ money in European boutiques on designer suits, shirts, neckties, pajamas and shoes. What type of leader is this? This was the highest expression of vanity and greed in a leader of a poor people and a poor country. Chiluba was trying to live on the moon when the great majority of his people were living on less than a dollar a day.

The commitment and dedication of Dr Kaunda and his comrades cannot be matched by any of the leaders that followed him. Not even Levy Mwanawasa’s record can be compared to that of Dr Kaunda. As for Rupiah Banda, he is a disaster and that’s why his preference in terms of leadership style is that of Chiluba whom he sees as having been “a damn good president”. If one admires a thief, if one looks at a thief as being a damn good president, that should show you what type of person he is.

What we need to always bear in mind is that the Zambian people are not struggling for ideas, for things in one’s head. They are struggling to win material benefits, to live better and in peace, to see their lives go forward, to guarantee the future of their children. What they are seeking is genuine democracy in which the political leaders are servants of the electorate and not its masters.

Our country will only move forward when we have intelligent, honest and humble leaders who see politics as a vocation to serve the people; who are aware that politics is an area of great importance for promoting justice, peace, development and community among all; political leaders who regard politics as a vocation, a way of building society for the common good.

Dr Kaunda was able to move our country forward because he based his leadership on morality, on selfless public service, on love for his fellow citizens and humanity in general – on humanism. Let us try in a new time and in a new way to restore this concept of political leadership. Let us teach ourselves and others that political leadership should be an expression of a desire to contribute to the happiness of the community rather than of a need to cheat and rape the community. Let us teach ourselves and others that political leadership can be not only the art of the possible, especially if this means the art of speculation, calculation, intrigue, secret deals and pragmatic manoeuvring, but it can even be the art of the impossible, namely the art of improving the lives of our people.

Let us not allow the desire to serve oneself to completely take over our politics. What we need is a humane Republic which serves the individual and which therefore holds the hope that the individual will serve it in turn. What we need is a Republic of well-rounded people, because without such, it is impossible to solve any of our problems, human, economic, environmental, social or political. If we realise this, hope will return to our hearts. Let us not be mistaken: the best government in the world, the best parliament and the best president, cannot achieve much on their own. This can only be achieved with our full participation and therefore responsibility from us all. There is need for us to realise and accept the fact that it is up to us all, and up to us only, to do something about the quality of our political leadership.

Our country is not flourishing today. The enormous creative and spiritual potential of our nation is not being used sensibly. Zambia is in trouble today not because her people have failed, but because her leaders have failed. And what Zambia needs today are political leaders to match the greatness of her people.

Political leadership is the instrument by which people co-operate together in order to achieve the common good. Political leadership is needed to guide the energies of all towards the common good.

Therefore, politics needs people with very high levels of commitment to selfless public service; it needs people with very high levels of credibility who are ready to square up to the biblical requirement: “Whoever wishes to be the first among you must be slave of all” (Mark 10:14).

If our country is to move forward, honest and dedicated political leadership is demanded from all our politicians; a leadership that does not steal public funds to enrich itself and one that is responsible in the use of public funds.

There are people in our country who each day cannot meet the basic needs necessary for a decent human life. And because of this, we need a political leadership that understands the fact that it is a duty of justice and truth not to allow fundamental needs to remain unsatisfied – living conditions must be improved especially for the low income earners. We need a political leadership that sees a great danger in government policies not being combined with clear social concern and likely to bring economic deprivation.

People want to be guided by political leaders they respect and who have a clear sense of direction. To gain respect, political leaders must be ethical. And a sense of direction is achieved by the political leadership conveying a strong vision of the future. We no longer see that in our country. All what we see is greed and vanity; pomposity and lack of humility; intolerance and repression; selfishness and corruption.

What we see in our country today is a political leadership that is bringing nothing but shame and humiliation to us. Almost every one of them is trying harder to make more money for themselves than to sacrifice for the collective good of our people. Now individualism and greed reign supreme. And sadly, our legislative organ has become a rubberstamp of the executive, which in turn is more influenced by external actors. That is why the question of quality, calibre, integrity and vision of our political leadership remains a crucial issue for the future of our country.

When we were campaigning for the return to multiparty politics at the beginning of the 1990s, the dominant view was to say “if only we could promote human rights and get democracy back in our country, all would be well. Democracy is a solution to our problems”. However, this has neither delivered the results we desired nor does it seem to have any lasting effects.

The question now is how do we create a good leadership that treats our people equally and distributes the goods and services in a fair and equitable manner?

Today our country is saddled with poor, even malevolent, leadership: predatory kleptocrats and puffed-up posturers. These leaders have been using power as an end in itself, rather than for the public good; they are indifferent to the progress of their citizens – although anxious to receive their adulation; they are unswayed by reason and employ poisonous social doctrines; and they are hypocrites, always shifting blame on others. Under the stewardship of these leaders, corruption has increased, much needed public funds are being stolen by them and their agents.

Clearly, what we now urgently need is a leadership that has the courage to speak out the truth, concern for social justice, desire to work for the common good instead of self-enrichment, disposition to use power for service, especially service of the poor and underprivileged, openness to dialogue, good moral standing, transparency and accountability to the electorate. We need a leadership that tries to follow the example of Jesus, who came not to be served but to serve (John 13:2-17) and who emptied himself for the good of everyone (Phil 2:5-11). We need a political leadership that is committed and dedicated to serving the Zambian people heart and soul and never for a moment divorce itself from the masses, to proceed in all cases from the interests of the people and not from one’s self interest or from the interests of a small group.

Dr Kaunda’s spirit, his utter devotion to others without any thought of self, his boundless sense of responsibility should guide us in the construction of a leadership that we need for this country. We must all learn the spirit of absolute selflessness from him. With this spirit, everyone can be useful to the people. A man’s ability may be great or small, but if he has this spirit, he is already noble-minded and pure, a man of moral integrity and above vulgar interests, a man who is of value to the people.

All our politicians, whatever their rank, should see themselves as servants of the people, and whatever they do should be to serve the people. Their duty should be to hold themselves responsible to the people. Every word, every act and every policy of theirs must conform to the people’s interests – that is what being responsible to the people means. They should have the interests of the people and the sufferings of the great majority at heart. They should have the largeness of mind and be staunch and active in looking upon the interests of the people as their very own lives and subordinating their personal interests to those of the people; they should be more concerned about the masses than about any individual, and more concerned about others than about themselves. Only thus can they be considered good political leaders.

Every political leader must be brought to understand that the supreme test of their words and deeds is whether they conform with the highest interests and enjoy the support of the overwhelming majority of our people. At no time and in no circumstances should they place their personal interests first; they should subordinate them to the interests of the nation and the masses. Hence, selfishness, corruption and so on and so forth, should be most contemptible, while selflessness, working with all one’s energy, wholehearted devotion to public duty should command respect. They must be ready at all times to stand up for the truth because truth is in the interest of the people. The exemplary role of good political leaders is of vital importance.

Labels: LEADERSHIP, MULENGA CHIBAMBA

posted by MrK @ 5:15 AM