Levy and the poor
By Laura Miti-Banda
Saturday August 25, 2007 [04:00]
And so President Levy Mwanawasa figures that poor Zambians who cannot afford to educate the children they bring into the world should keep their zips up. He cannot understand why the majority poor people in the country do not know better than to involve themselves in activities whose by-product is children.
Leave sex to us the rich damn you; he just about said at that place from which he loves to announce official government policy- the airport.
Very annoyed he was you see at the suggestion that parents of the poverty stricken children were finding it difficult to pay PTA fees at schools. What kind of nonsense is that, the big man exploded in response to MMD Copperbelt Province chairman, Terence Findlay? The man had ventured to relay to the powerful one this cry for help from the deprived, some gathered to welcome him. How can anybody in their right mind claim that they are not able to pay a little something towards their children’s education, the mighty President railed?
The government has scraped school fees for goodness sake. What else do you want us to do? All that you ungrateful poor people are asked to do now is pay PTA fees. These PTA fees (Levy argued somewhat bizarrely) should be easier to cough up because, unlike school fees, they do not come to government. PTA fees are not part of the government revenue that I and my ministers use to pay for our children (who unlike yours had the right to be born) to go to the 10 million kwacha a term Chengelo School.
It is not from those amounts that I fly up and down to different airports to address you. That money (which each school can set as it pleases in the name of school bus fund, wall fund, floor polish fund on and on ad infinitum (he might has well have added) stays in the school. So what on earth are you complaining about?
The President did not end there. He had more to say to the foolish man who had dared raise such a stupid issue with him and so he went on sounding more disgusted with each point: Next thing, Levy said, these poor people will be saying to government buy clothes for our children because we are too poor to clothe them. I have one thing to say. You have come to the wrong person with your whining.
You will find no sympathy with me. I say to you stand up and plead guilty to your poverty. Do not bring children into the world if you cannot take care of them. Child-bearing is the prerogative of the rich. As for you poor people, just keep on gathering in large crowds like this to welcome me when I arrive at airports. This kind of thing makes me very happy.
I guess the President was suggesting that for a society to function, each class must know its place. It is not for the poor to propagate (their inferior genes.) Levy must think also that if poor people were wise enough, the population in townships and villages would by now have reduced considerably. In that way he could rid himself of all the annoying civil society activists endlessly moaning about poverty alleviation strategies when the answer is the hands of the poor themselves –no copulation.
To be quite honest, I have kind of been waiting for President Mwanawasa to say that he was misquoted by The Post when they reported this diatribe. Yes we have become quite accustomed to the man’s by turns arrogant, bizarre or downright dumb public statements. With this one however, one has to ask, what on earth was the man thinking? (Or was he not, as usual?)
Interestingly in this same week, Levy found time to announce once again that he is a “lawyer wama lawyer.” The best there is. So is Minister of Justice and Attorney General. Greatly educated men these ones( with the right, of course, to do the things with their wives and girlfriends that lead to child-bearing) One is forced to ask, how did one Levy Mwanawasa, like most people his age, a son of a not much educated father and almost certainly illiterate mother end up being this “great lawyer”?
At the time he himself was born, did his parents have the right to give birth to him? Was it written in the stars the day of his conception that he would end up at the University of Zambia getting a law degree.
Had this Levy been born at this time to his very parents, under a President like him how far would he have gone in education? Is he suggesting, I wonder, that all those dusty, wet-nosed children we see running around the compounds with stomachs distended from malnutrition and worm infestation are vermin? That the government has no responsibility to them because they should not have been born anyway? Does he really think there are “lawyer wama lawyers” there?
Simply, what kind of buffoon does this country have in state house that he does not know that every child is 100 percent potential? It is a government’s prime duty to seek to develop that potential knowing that nobody knows from where the next Yotam Muleya, Lucy Sichone, Charles Mando, Paul Ngozi, Emmanuel Mulemena, brilliant Zambians that this country has failed thus far to replace, will come from.
In short I am saying Levy owes the country an apology for insulting the majority Zambian population. In stating that the poor among us have no right to hope that the child they hold in their arms may be a great light in their lives one day, he once again displays for all how totally out of touch with the needs and aspirations of the people he presides over this Levy Mwanawasa is.
lauramiti AT yahoo.co.uk
Labels: LAURA MITI-BANDA, MWANAWASA
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PF's unwavering support for impunity
By Laura Miti-Banda
Saturday June 30, 2007 [04:00]
There is something causing so much fatigue about the discussion that Zambia has embroiled herself in over former President Chiluba. It seems though, that it is a discussion we are going to have for sometime. Now we have members of parliament standing up and declaring that Chiluba has been unfairly treated.
Well at least now we know, from the MPs’ statements, that the Patriotic Front is as ever convinced of its president’s declaration during last year’s election campaign that former President Chiluba really has nothing to answer for to the country.
The Patriotic Front for some reason feels that the fact that President Chiluba may have used his office to misappropriate millions of dollars in public funds is, in the scheme of things, a very small matter indeed. It is to them quite clearly a case of “these things happen.” Nothing to fuss about too much. After all, the Patriotic Front senior leadership keeps saying to us, Chiluba did a lot of good for this country. He made some small mistakes yes but we all make mistakes.
It has to be noted that, what good the former President did exactly, the good that is supposed to weigh in heavier than his crimes when put on the balance, is never properly set out for us by the PF. It is a good I suppose, known only by those who were very close to Mr Chiluba to benefit in ways we the ordinary people could not.
Now, it is no secret what my personal sentiments as regards Chiluba and his presidency are. I have stated many times before that it is my considered opinion that Zambia is still an intact nation, all its problems considered, only because FTJ’s third term bid was stopped in its tracks by the Zambian people. I most certainly believe that there would be no Zambia as we know it, to talk about, had FTJ stayed in State House even six months longer than he did.
The very fabric of the nation was in deep trouble under Chiluba and, as I have again stated so often, Mwanawasa with all the particular mode of nonsense has wrought on the nation instigated changes that saved Zambia from complete lunacy.
And yet a party with a considerable representation in parliament can take the unwaveringly supporting stance that the PF repeatedly has on Chiluba. It’s members of Parliament can publicly declare that Zambia is wrong in hating the guts of the former president and wanting recompense from him. It is so disturbing.
But then we should not really be surprised. In Zambia after all, party members, members of Parliament included, are not allowed to have positions on any issue, no matter how frivolous, that go against the party leader’s. As we saw with the MMD under Chiluba, men who had won safari suits for nearly 3 decades (because safari suits were the great leader’s attire of choice) suddenly decked themselves in three piece suits with ties and ridiculous little matching handkerchiefs in the pocket, simply because the new leader dressed that way.
Adult men failed to find it in themselves to say ‘the new culture handkerchief is really not for me.” They had to conform.
If cabinet ministers have felt compelled to change what they wear in order to keep the President happy, what chance, pray, is there that any MP will stand up to a party president and say - your personal vendetta against another man will not determine how I play my politics.
Simply, I am saying that it would seem that the Patriotic Front, in the matter of one FTJ Chiluba, is taking a stance determined by the fact that one Michael Chilufya Sata, president of the said PF, hates anything the smells even mildly of Patrick Levy Mwanawasa -the man who entered State House (twice over) when he (Sata) was sure that the presidency was a done deal.
Sata for a while was incensed with Chiluba for passing him over in selecting who to place in State House after his plans to overstay were mercilessly derailed by a mass of citizens wearing green ribbons. However, the resentment Sata carries against FTJ’s chosen replacement is (inexplicably) stronger than that which he ever had against the man who made the decision.
Sata therefore, made up with FTJ as soon as Levy fell out with the former president. I guess it was more fulfilling for him to hate Levy for being in State House than to keep up the quarrel with Chiluba for putting him there. (Bizarre psyche, I know, but anyhow.)
Of course beyond that simple explanation for Sata’s support for Chiluba’s crimes is the fact that Sata himself was very much in the mix when the said crimes were committed.
The result of all this is that Sata has never enjoyed the “fight against corruption” not because it is the farce of a fight we all know it is.
He does not like it because it is a part of history he would love to have the public forget because there is much he himself has to explain about it.
And so the PF leader is going to cause a whole political party to stand up and insist that a former president who treated the country’s resources with such impunity as Chiluba did, should not be vilified. In fact, the country should find good in that theft. And then Sata will continue to insist that the people of Zambia should consider the PF as an alternative party in power to the MMD. That voters should consider putting him into State House one day.
My question simply is, what do Zambian politicians take the Zambian people for? What does Sata (and his PF) think Zambia is? I guess to him, it is a stage on which to play out his personal games. He wants us to agree to be the supporting cast as politicians do whatever they like with us. Sata, it seems, wants us to cheer on as MPs with no fear of recrimination stand up and say the former President stole, messed up the country but so what? Put us in power so that we can make sure no questions are ever asked about it.
lauramiti AT yahoo_co_uk
Labels: CHILUBA, LAURA MITI-BANDA, PF, SATA
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What are we waiting for?
By Laura Miti-Banda
Saturday June 16, 2007 [04:00]
In reading back, this week, on articles on the constitution question that have appeared in this column, as well as those done by other people, it struck me that Levy made a decision long ago that he would never allow the people of Zambia to write a constitution for themselves like they were demanding.
Knowing that, he however allowed excessive amounts of time and money to be spent on the constitution review debate caring absolutely nothing about the wastefulness. This week, I have therefore decided to republish an article done over a year ago just to remind the nation of how Levy has played with us all like fools.
This is an excerpt from an article entitled “Epitaph” that appeared in this column in February 2006, after Mr Mwanawasa made an announcement that seemed to suggest that Zambians might after all get the constituent assembly they so desperately wanted:
When a couple of weeks ago, President Mwanawasa announced that the Mung’omba reviewed constitution will be adopted by a constituent assembly I felt a sense of deep anger.
My first response to Mwanawasa’s statement was to think: of the overall amount of money that has been used by both government and civil society over the question of the adoption of the reviewed Republican Constitution were to be tallied, I wonder how much it would come to. Did it have to be spent as it was?
You see Mwanawasa’s Presidency, will not be remembered for long but when it is, it will be for its scandalous wastefulness. President Mwanawasa must have known for a long time that, sooner or later, he was bound to give in to the popular demand for a constituent assembly.
He, in fact, begun by saying all he needed was a confirmation from the people via the Mung’omba Commission that they wanted one and he would give it to them. Then he began to play games. “It’s not possible because of financial cost , he said, then it was, “its not possible because of legal impediments;” and even “ it’s not possible because I do not want it.”
As he danced his merry jig around the issue, money this country can ill afford was being spent by civil society to gather the people’s voice and by Mwanawasa to counter it. The cost in time, labour and money has to be in the billions.
And this is a cost that did not begin with the final battle over the constituent assembly. President Mwanawasa begun his presidency by refusing to review the constitution at all or is it trying to ignore the matter. The Oasis Forum and wider civil society had to spend lots of money to meet him at State House and garner public pressure for a review before he finally gave in.
When he did, Levy, characteristically, set up the Constitution Review Commission in such a way that millions more would be spent by civil society in provincial forums to talk about the inquiries Act and why it was the wrong instrument to once again set up the CRC under. More money was to be spent in fights over the appointment process of commissioners.
At each point, Levy had a choice to make. Take the easier, saner, less expensive road to serve the good of all or watch unconcerned as billions were poured down the drain over a battle that did not need to be fought. We shall not go into what those billions could have been used for either in the constitution review process itself or else in service provision.
Now, one would expect that after all that he has put this nation through, Levy would by now have realised his folly, and be deeply remorseful for the senseless waste of resources he has caused this nation to suffer over its constitution. But heck no!
Just look at the statement he made:
‘There will be a constituent assembly since you want it. I really do not want it. So you will get it against my will. It will happen if money is found by government and whosoever will. It will happen if Parliament passes the law to cause it to take place but that depends on whether Parliament wants to or not.’
And so, once again, Levy makes a statement that means nothing.
Until Parliament has passed the law to facilitate the creation of the constituent assembly, nothing is certain. It is for that reason that Levy left that avenue open. The object of the statement was to announce that he is going to have the next election under the current constitution and maybe there will be a constituent assembly.
What he intended, I think, was to trick the people into relaxing their militant stance over their basic document. Levy is not entirely dull. He knew that any announcement that sounded as though he had given in on the CA would, for a moment anyway, and hopefully long enough, cause Zambians to celebrate a victory that had not happened.
There was nothing binding in his statement just as there was nothing binding in his saying I will give you a CA if you tell Mung’omba you want it.
So once again the people of Zambia may have to fight to see the necessary Bill in Parliament. They may have to fight to ensure that the constituent assembly takes place and then have to fight to ensure that it is made up of a credible representation of the various interest groups in the country.
In other words, more money will have to be wasted. That is unless of course, for once, President Mwanawasa does the right thing inexpensively. The interesting point is that the man still has a chance to rescue his presidency from an epitaph that says: Boring, expensive, wasteful, delivered nothing! Who knows what choice he will make? Maybe this time it will be different and the constituent assembly will come without further waste.
Well we know now don’t we that Levy never is going to choose a path on the Constitution that is in the best interests of this country he governs. He is chronically, almost criminally, self interested. The question that arises in my mind is, should we really as a nation continue to treat such a man with civility? At every turn he has lied to us and still we have given his presidency due respect.
It would seem to me that the Oasis Forum that called for the Red campaign last week, and all those that love Zambia should rethink their stance. We should not be waiting for Levy to lose at the “unnecessary referendum” before we demand his resignation.” Levy must be pushed to either do the right thing now, give us a constituent assembly or resign.
After all, I ask, what are we waiting for? What de we have to guarantee that even that referendum will be transparently held or its results respected. The hour has come for the people of Zambia to say Levy Mwanawasa “we have had enough of you.” The choice given to him therefore should be a constituent assembly or new elections. After all the money is there for a referendum we might as well use it for a change of a sick administration. That is my considered view
lauramiti@yahoo.co.uk
Labels: CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY, CONSTITUTION, LAURA MITI-BANDA
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