I have no doubt that United Party for National Development (UPND) president Mr Hakainde Hichilema is a a good man with a good heart and good intentions for Zambia. However, his recent political tactics are painting an ugly picture of a man seemingly out of touch with reality.
Recent events such as careless wanton teargassing of people, torturing murder suspects in the Ruth Mbandu court case to force a fake confession out of them, the unresolved death of Mapenzi Chibulo or the very suspicious death of a Zambia Air Force officer in police custody suggest that the police are becoming trigger happy. It seems they know they will be backed up whenever things go wrong.
My father often reminds me that when I was a small boy, I asked him what the best job in the world was, to which he responded, “Thinking!” I was surprised by the answer and yet it is so true. Why is it that in Zambia we always rush to ban things without being calm and thinking things through?
“A person who has twice held office as President is not eligible for election as President.” We submit that President Lungu has “twice held office”. The first was in January 2015, and the second was in September 2016, after the August 2016 elections. Article 106(2) states as follows: “A President shall hold office from the date the President-elect is sworn into office and ending on the date the next President-elect is sworn into office.”
The Zambian Republican president Mr Edgar Chagwa Lungu has finally come out in the open to say he wants to be President until 2026. The debate on the legality of an ECL third term has started.
I recently found myself in the company of a local Lusaka bargain hunter and we ended up at Soweto Market to purchase some vegetables. We went to the part right …
When I was a young man, one thing that was greatly valued was the art of “The Vibes” or “chuffing”; the ability of a guy to be charming and talk to a chick in a manner that made her begin liking him within minutes, without taking her out even if he was broke like a church mouse.
I suspect that the unlikely victory of DJT over HRC was primarily due to a rejection of wholesale corruption in the American government system, of which Clinton was the poster girl as the consummate insider.
This picture from 2015 ranks annual salaries of African presidents from highest to lowest on the left and on the right how they compare to the average earnings of their respective citizens (Gross National Income per capita).
Take a pay cut. Other leaders have taken a pay cut such as Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta (20%), Namibian President Hage Geingob (20%), Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari (50%) and French president François Hollande (30%).
Zambian political parties always excel at outdoing each other in how many free things they promise Zambians during election campaigns. Free education from grade one to university, free fertilizer, free hospitals, free clinics, free title deeds, free land, free loans, free solar hammer mills; free, free, free.
If you spend an average of 5 minutes going through a roadblock, 4 in a day means you lose 20 minutes of productivity. Going through 10 sets of 4 roadblocks a month at 20 minutes each set is 2,400 minutes a year or 40 hours, which is a full working week lost each year! A person who earns around K4,000 per month will lose close to K1,000 in productivity per year as they go through roadblocks.
Whilst the Vodafone service is fast and great value for money, it is not for everybody. It is skewed towards the middle to upper class income brackets and is not yet very student friendly.
Based on the last Transparency International Corruption Perception Index, 6 out of 10 most corrupt countries in the entire world are from Africa. 7 out of the 10 least corrupt …
For the longest time, I thought that our political leaders make bad decisions over the country because they are ignorant or lack exposure. For some it may be true, but it slowly dawned on me that when politicians are in power, they more or less know exactly what they are doing, even if the decisions they make seem senseless. There is a rational logic to what they do.
Why is Donald Trump the front-runner in the Republican nomination to the horror of many people? This is a guy whose venom knows no bounds.
We are about to elect the seventh president in about six and a half months and we are in for a roller-coaster ride, if recent political events are anything to go by. We shall all need sackfuls of popcorn as the political drama unfolds with new parties being formed, alliances being forged, defections and counter-defections accompanied by endless media statements about how so and so is not a factor.
I am amused and amazed in equal measure as the constitutional debate keeps raging that almost everyone from political parties, churches, NGOs and every interest group in Zambia are all purporting to speak on behalf of “the people” as they all make various demands that are often incompatible and contradictory.
The Zambia Institute of Advanced Legal Education (ZIALE) must be the most organized cartel in Zambia. The latest results, showing that only 18 people out of 187 (9.6%) who sat the bar exam are worthy of holding practicing certificates proves that the powers that be at ZIALE must be some of the most selfish people in this country. I do not mean to be mean and rude, but that is exactly how I and many other Zambians see these people.
When I first read the story alleging that 2016 US Presidential candidate Donald Trump had called blacks (especially Africans) as “lazy fools only good at eating, lovemaking and thuggery”, I knew it could not possibly be true.
