PRESIDENTS AND WITCHES

By Gershom Ndhlovu

 

I did not see the article which quoted Honourable Gabriel Namulambe, Presidential Affairs Minister, in which he argued against having a vice presidential running mate in an election, citing “witchcraft” as the reason until a friend drew me to it.

“Let us bear in mind that in Africa there is witchcraft and the vice-president might bewitch the Republican president in order to take over the presidency...,” Namulambe is said to have told National Constitution Conference (NCC) delegates.

Whether this was a joke or not, is difficult to say but this statement staggered me for its naivety and irrationality.

It, however, does not come as a surprise to anyone who followed the then acting President Banda on his campaign tour for the October 30 election which he later won. On his visit to a chief’s palace in one of the provinces, he told the nation that he felt protected from witchcraft. I suspect it was after some “protection” ritual was performed on him by the same chief.

With Banda and Namulambe’s statements, I feel that governance in Zambia has been taken to its nadir especially if what goes into the future constitution or, indeed, if government policies are predicated on witchcraft.

I would like to believe that Namulambe’s contribution against a vice president as a running mate of the presidential candidate in the constitution was Namulambe’s personal view. But if it was discussed with the President, then Zambians should drop their brows in shame and sorrow at the way their affairs are being handled.

At the same time, the argument by Namulambe has been a common phenomenon in African politics in the last fifty years of African independence.

Author Martin Meredith, in his book, The State of Africa: A history of Fifty Years of Independence narrates how leaders like the late Felix Houephet-Boigny of Ivory Coast and Zaire’s late Mobutu Sese Seko disdained the idea of a vice president, often saying that there was no number two, three or four, it was only Houephet-Boigny.

Mobutu likened himself to a chief who did not need to consult anybody on what decisions he took. As such he appointed prime ministers and disappointed them at will. It was not, therefore, accidental that there was a lot of insecurity among those appointed as prime ministers. Some unfortunate ones who showed an unhealthy interest in taking over from the man were incarcerated if they were lucky otherwise they were fed to the crocodiles.

In Zambia, from early on in the political life of the nation, the position of Vice President was done away with under President Kaunda. Two positions were created, that of UNIP Secretary General who was the de facto Vice President and that of Prime Minister but the office holders could be removed at will by the appointing authority.

The advent of multi-party politics and the ascendancy of the MMD to power did not help matters. The President still retained the power to appoint the Vice President such that in 10 years of President Chiluba’s tenure, no less than four people served in the Vice President’s office. The first was Levy Mwanawasa, now late, who was the MMD vice president then, followed by General Godfrey Miyanda, who was replaced with General Christon Tembo and later Enoch Kavindele who continued as President Mwanawasa’s Vice President.

Under President Mwanawasa, apart from Kavindele, three other people were to serve as Vice Presidents. There was Nevers Mumba, Lupando Mwape, and Rupiah Banda who took over the presidency upon the demise of the incumbent president, Levy Mwanawasa.

Ironically, it is under these circumstances that the NCC, Mwanawasa’s creation, has been debating the need for a vice presidential running mate in the presidential elections to avoid costly elections in the event of misfortune such as death befalling the incumbent.

Even more ironical, it is the people in Banda’s administration—who took over from a man who died in office—who are now saying a vice president can bewitch a sitting president for him to take over.

Surely, is Namulambe telling us something we do not know about President Banda in the art of witchcraft?

….

The pronouncement by President Banda that government will continue evacuating leaders to South Africa for treatment sounded the death knell for the University Teaching Hospital and other local health facilities to which the ordinary folk go when they suffer from debilitating diseases like heart ailments, renal failure, etc.

Poor Zambians have been known to die because they could not afford the cost of dialysis which is far and away from their reach while those with political connections have been evacuated abroad for colds, flus and ear infections.

I have visited hospitals in most parts of the country ranging from Sichili Mission hospital in Sesheke, to Chilonga Mission Hospital in Mpika, Kabompo Hospital and Nyimba Hospital, you name them. For the mission hospitals, the missionaries try their best to provide for the patients who are mostly villagers in surrounding catchment areas. Government hospitals are truly run down even the local District Commissioner would not want to be admitted to one.

For people from Kuku, Chazanga and Desai, going to hospitals such as Lusaka Trust—most Lusaka residents don’t even know where it is and yet it is just a stone’s throw away from the UTH—and Maina Soko Military Hospital which are just about the best quasi-public health facilities in the country is a dream. Being flown to South Africa for them would be a dream to end all dreams.

For President Banda to say leaders—Chief Justice Ernest Sakala, Parliamentary Chief Whip Vernon Mwaanga and Minister of Science and Technology Peter Daka have been evacuated to South Africa—would continue to be evacuated abroad is a kick in the teeth of the people who want to see an overhaul of the health delivery service.

The Zambian government can procure the machinery that those who are taken abroad go to be treated on for a local hospital, never mind the personnel because some Zambian medics and paramedics man these facilities at those foreign hospitals the leaders go to.

NCC MEMBERS MUST BE SERIOUS

By Gershom Ndhlovu

 

The fundamental problem with Zambia’s constitutions in the last four decades is that they have been tailored to suit individuals, and if not that, they have been made to fix people who appeared to have dissenting views from that of the government in power.

In this on-going constitution-writing exercise, the delegates to the National Constitution Conference (NCC) are going the same way that has forced the nation to write and re-write the constitution several times in the soon to be 45 years of independence.

One of the most curious recommendations that the delegates are intent to include in the constitution is obviously meant to embarrass PF president Michael Sata who has an on-going tiff with a number of his MPs whom the party has “expelled” for defying it over the same NCC which they have clung on contrary to the party’s position.

The recommendation that MPs expelled from their parties should instead serve as independent MPs is not only absurd in its logic, it would simply perpetuate indiscipline among the parliamentarians within their parties knowing fully well that they would retain their seats. Apart from that, the nation would end up with 150 independent members of parliament who, in the unlikely event that they were all expelled from their parties.

But again, this would be one way in which a ruling party would sow confusion in opposition parties by alienating MPs from their own parties and thereby beef up its numbers in the house.

Another vexing issue is that of benefits to a convicted former head of state. Clearly, this issue is being discussed with former President Frederick Chiluba’s on-going court cases in mind. Some delegates argue that in the event that a former head of state is convicted, he should lose his retirement benefits while others say that it would be tantamount to punishing someone twice.

Continuing giving a convicted former head of state gratuity could be likened to the proverbial “having your cake and eating it.” Such a person would be benefiting from two sources of income—the pension and other entitlements from government as well as from the proceeds of crime one is convicted of.

The best option would be for them to lose all the benefits apart from the house built for them if the conviction happens after it has been constructed otherwise they have to lose everything. Such a scenario would discourage any sitting president from dipping their fingers in the national till.

Without exercising objectivity in their constitution writing mission, NCC delegates will come up with a pedantic document which the next ruler who would not agree with it, re-write it and therefore costing the nation more resources that should be used in other areas of need such as infrastructure development or social services.

I wonder if this is what NCC spokesperson Mwangala Zaloumis told the nation about, that the delegates were doing a lot of thinking and deserved even more money in allowances than they are getting now. The political orientation of most of the delegates leaves much to be desired, especially if some of the delegates, like Church leaders who were on one radio station justifying corruption in some circles, are among those writing the national constitution.

Zambia needs a robust but fair constitution that is not targeted at settling some petty political scores between the ruling MMD and opposition parties. The vision and object of the new constitution should be able to stand the test of time, to borrow an overused but overlooked term in the country’s constitution making process.

….

Is it not sad that diseases such as cholera and typhoid keep breaking out in Zambia’s urban and peri-urban areas? The latest case of typhoid in Wusakile and Chamboli areas boils down to one thing—the use of communal toilets particularly in the D section of Wusakile.

This is the section between Wusakile Basic School and somewhere near the hospital and the A section somewhere near the mine shaft on the way to Chamboli through Nkana Basic School.

Obviously the sanitary state of these toilets leaves much to be desired considering that in the past when these houses where owned by the Zambia Consolidated Copper Mines (ZCCM), there were people employed to clean them. I doubt if there is anyone dedicated to cleaning these facilities in which there is very little dignity in using them.

I know for sure that in the past there were no doors to the row of cubicles with the small holes on which people squatted for the call of nature. And for flushing, and that time water was in constant supply, there was a tank at the end that emptied automatically at set times.

It was the same case in Mindolo, but in that township as in some parts of Wusakile, the mine owners at the time demolished most of those one or two-roomed ramshackles and replaced them with properly designed houses which included an inbuilt toilet.

Incidentally, there are still bigger parts of Kitwe, and unfortunately other parts of the bigger cities such as Ndola, Lusaka and Livingstone, not to mention smaller towns and most of the rural areas, where pit-latrines are still in use.

I remember Kitwe’s Kwacha in particular, where a bigger portion of the township still has pit latrines in use which used to get flooded with water rising above the pit-latrines with human waste floating about way back in the 1980s.

It is really a miracle that those days there were no diseases such as cholera which later became endemic in the area. By 1992, cholera was sweeping across most of Kitwe such that then, the authorities were forced to bury victims in mass graves.

For Wusakile residents, two waste removal trucks and unblocking sewer lines may be too little too late. The solution lies in replacing those communal toilets with individual facilities. But the problem is that the houses are in private hands and it boils down to having money—or more likely not having it—for such an exercise by the so-called landlords.