Ta- Lakata by Zindaba Nyirenda - A contra positive to Dambisa Moyo’s Dead Aid.

Book Review - Part 1

In this book Ta Lakata (we are dying) Zindaba Nyirenda expresses at times painfully, what many Africans belabor, the quest for self-identification, personal conflicts with modernity and our collective anguish and inability to prevent the loss of so many lives to disease and poverty.

Using her native tongue Tumbuka, where English fails to give full meaning, she explains her lineage and personalizes Zambia’s fate under colonial and post independence governance. What emerges is picture endemic in all of Africa, that the colonialists, as do multi national investors now, only needed the collusion of a few rulers to gain unfettered access to Africa’s wealth of natural resources.

But rather than outline Zambia’s decent through the prism of poor Zambians in urban settings, she unlike Dambisa Moyo (Zindaba’s cousin, contemporary-author of Dead aid) takes the reader to rural Zambia, remembering her place and time in a village setting. She paints a graphic mosaic of life in Lundazi, a poor part of the eastern province where she and Dambisa Moyo trace their family trees; it is representative of most of rural Zambia. Now as then, it lacks clean water, basic shelter, adequate health centers, schools, and roads.

The lives of rural Zambians have, in large part, been the melting pot between western ideals and local interests; dating back to a time when colonial masters imposed head taxes on poor villagers, to force them into mining labor.

What is the best way to bring their daily lives within the norms of 21^st century livelihood?

That is at the heart of this book and “Dead Aid” by Dambisa Moyo- is the answer curbing exploitation by western entities or stopping the theft and waste of public funds by corrupt governments?

Zindaba would like to start from the genesis of western involvement in Africa, she wants a meeting or indaba with agents of the principals from the 1884 Berlin meeting, that set in motion the colonization of Africa. To reset, the terms of western engagement in Africa and demand restitution for plundered resources. She takes particular aim, at the Rhodes scholarship, which was founded with funds from Cecil Rhodes estate, but has only benefited (3) three Zambians since it was started in 1902.

She contends that, since the Rhodes scholarship fund consists of proceeds from mineral resource exploitation from Northern Rhodesia (named after Cecil Rhodes), it should therefore benefit more Zambians. By contrast, 39 Americans have received Rhodes scholarships. Though Rhodes intended recipients to meet the highest academy requires, southern Africans should have a comparative advantage over other regions whose resources were spared by his untimely death - Cecil Rhodes is said to have once remarked

“I contend that we are the first race in the world, and that the more of the world we inhabit the better it is for the human race...If there be a God, I think that what he would like me to do is paint as much of the map of Africa British Red as possible...”

Zindaba also, bemoans the poisoning of rivers and the pollution of air as a result of poorly regulated mining activities of western firms since the 1920’s. She attributes the high incidence of respiratory diseases on the copperbelt to polluted air and poisonous metals dumped into the Kafue River. To redress this she, calls for educated Zambians to return from Diaspora, to oversee environmental intervention programs, monitoring and restoration of water systems.

After the Trial: A Case for Tort Reform in Zambia.

Now that reason has prevailed in the frivolous case, against Zambian journalist Chansa Kabwela., it is perhaps time to reflect how we got to this point

I found BBC ‘s Jo Fidgen’s comment after observing the whole charade most telling;

“It seems to me that Zambia's social conservatism is in tune with a Britain that no longer exists.” she said.

Against strong attempts to avoid drawing a post hoc ergo propter hoc conclusion, I wonder -

Was there ever a time, when Zambia’s social conservatism was ever in tune with Britain?

It seems to me that her majesty’s forgone empire has always cast that awful spell in all her former dominions that taught even coerced her subjects - to present an appearance and behavior of a British social system.

In Zambia as in much of the former colonies, keeping up that appearance is still more important than the substance of daily life.

So sacred is the legacy of that British law as it was handed down that we can not bear to amend it in the slightest, to right modern day wrongs. Even draconian laws that were specifically conceived in the colonial period to enforce public order, in the face of legitimate insurrections for freedom by the natives are still preserved, in a present day independent Zambia.

The case of the “porn journalist” poignantly displays the dilemma of a present day Zambian stuck in a system framed for a different time.

The actual victim in the case, the wronged woman whose baby and privacy were fatally assaulted, can not sue. There is no legal remedy for her against this vicious affront perpetuated by the hospital and the state.

While in Britain even the NHS constitution provides remedies to make a claim for judicial review if you think you've been directly affected by an unlawful act or decision of an NHS body, and receive compensation if you've been harmed, the Zambian system still returns a fatal attraction to the fidelity of colonial law.

I think it time, for Zambian legal minds to write and enact laws that will address the challenges of modern day Zambian lives. My I suggest the current Zambian penal code and Tort law as the starting point.

Attention all Africa - Good Governance wanted!

In his recent interview with the BBC, Mo Ibrahim explains why no ex-leader has won the award for good governance this year. You can see the interview here

Mo Ibrahim interview on BBC

This comes with no surprise to me, the state of global leadership much more in Africa, has over the years been in limbo, till the advent of Barack Obama. In the last era, most Africans could name a few prominent continental leaders, the likes of Nelson Mandela but now that he is no longer active politically there is none standing up to his statue.
In the book Prince by Machiavelli, he states there are two ways a prince or leader is made- by preparation or good fortune.
Those that have been prepared over a life span by mentors, education and experiences are most likely to posses the ability to lead and be successful. However those that find themselves installed as leader by the good fortune of benefactors, soon find themselves without ability to govern the masses and are left prone to the whims of their installers.

This sadly is the state of most leaders in Africa today, they have been installed by external influences to cater to outside interests rather than the needs of those they govern. In Egypt President Mubarak is retained to preserve geo-political stability, while the west ponders a peace deal for the Israeli -Palestinian conflict.
In Nigeria a corrupt political regime is tolerated to keep the oil flowing, while in Kenya Kibaki a tyrant by all measures rules as we all hold our nose under the pretense of avoiding civil war, this also applies in Zimbabwe.
In DRC as in Zambia, accidents of death by design in one case and fate in the other have installed ill equipped novices, to govern masses with severe needs.

As I listened to Mo Ibrahim make the case for want of good leadership in Africa, I couldn't imagine but wonder how long it will take for Africans to get their act together. How long before we realize, we can not put up with cronies any longer?

Another critical factor, highlight in the interview, was the absence of relevant statistical data for most African states. What is known of measurements of important elements like poverty, education health etc are crude estimations of western visitors that do not bear the remotest semblance to the conditions or state of so many Africans.

It is essential, that Africans know and understand for themselves their immediate estate, rather than continue to validate western perceptions.
As Sun Tzu writes in the art of war, one must posses the knowledge of one's strength and know that of one's adversaries, in order to succeed in any endeavor . In this regard, it is not always external influences that impose adverse conditions of poverty and under development upon so many Africans. Cultural adherence and often a lack of personal drive for self improvement are as much to blame, especially in parts where violent conflict has been absent.

Africans must demand more from our current system of governance, we must ensure basic systems exist to collect social indicators; a basic structure to track life from the cradle to the grave.
Inadequate clinics, schools, roads even insufficient legislative representation stem not so much from a lack of resources as from the lack of useful data to match population needs to infrastructure capacity. This can not be allowed to persists at a time, that a goat herder on slopes of a remote hill in Kenya, can receive a money transfer to his cell phone from any part of the world.

It is only when more Africans begin to take a keen interest in creating and maintaining an accountable system of governance that more Africans will begin to seize the opportunities that exist to exploit African resources for our own benefit rather than external interests.
Just as, Mo Ibrahim was able to envision an opportunity to sell more than 25 millions phones across Africa, more African entrepreneurs may begin to envision other opportunities to exploit.

Justice by executive order – The Era of Bwezani Banda

“It took me five minutes from when Mr [William] Harrington asked for the tribunal to be set up and the judge-in-charge of that phoned me in my office here to say that we have had a citizen who has come to request for a tribunal to be set up in order to answer certain questions regarding Dora Siliya. It took me less than five minutes to say please go ahead.....” (President Rupiah Banda press conference – 24th June 2009 Transcript of Q & A Session -The Post).

By his own admission Rupiah Bwezani Banda exposed how he can fix or influence any case brought under the Zambian judicial process. Whether by design or fate, his chilling admission in that ill-fated press conference during which a monkey peed on his presidency, he on his part exposed how an overbearing executive can pee on the Judiciary.
The justices it appears cannot do anything without consulting the almighty Bwezani for approval or are they been made to check with the almighty before adjudicating important cases.

If that is the case, it is no wonder why Ndola High Court registrar Jones Chinyama had to postpone his verdict in the Frederick Chiluba case last Friday, only to come back today with rumblings that consumed more than six (6) hours yet ended with a bizarre acquittal of Chiluba. He obviously spent the whole weekend consulting President Rupiah Banda.
And for all the support Chiluba has given Rupiah Banda, in the elections and on key decisions like selling Zamtel, Bwezani could not allow Magistrate Jones Chinyama to send Chiluba to jail.
Despite the overwhelming evidence presented, which in some bizarre fashion was sufficient to convict his principal accomplices Faustin Kabwe and Aaron Chungu to 3 years of hard labor prison sentences, Chiluba come off without the slightest pretense of a reprimand. Chiluba was the President in charge when Kabwe and Chungu were stealing; further the evidence for all intents and purposes points to the duo carrying water on Chiluba’s behalf.

Doesn’t he bear some responsibility, if not all? Does the buck not stop at plot one?

None of that matters in the era of Bwezani, just like we’ve heard of the return of smelly hospitals, strikes, university closures, and patients on hunger strike, wait that’s a first.
Even under the latter horror of UNIP, patient could at least find refuge in hospitals, what kind of hostilities are now forcing patients in Zambia, to go on a hunger strike?

As I have bloviated before, the executive wing of the Zambian government needs some of it’s power clipped off, the Zambian people through several constitution reviews including the on going NCC, have consistently demanded a reduction of the current excessive power and untoward influence being exerted the President.
The executive under the current system is sucking all the oxygen in the room; he decides how much pay nurses and doctor get, even when their pay should go up. He decides how much allowance and when university students should get it; he decides how and to whom companies like Zamtel should be sold to and he can ever sway the outcome of any election in Zambia.
You may wonder really?
How is that possible?
Well, it took five minutes for Rupiah Banda to weigh on a private citizen’s petition to setup a tribunal to investigate Dora Siliya.
The chief justice under section 13 (3) of the Parliamentary and Ministerial code of conduct act, chapter 16 of the Laws of Zambia is duly authorized to constitute a tribunal if the petitioner or complainant presents prima facie evidence for all the essential facts of the case. Yet in less than five minutes the chief justice had exhausted all his legal authority and independence, the almighty Rupiah Banda had to know about this case, he had to approve whether the case proceeds or not.
Proof that it is not the weight of evidence that determines the outcome of significant legal cases in Zambia; it is the executive that calls the shorts.
It therefore follows, that Magistrate Jones Chinyama had to buy himself more time before passing judgment on Chiluba, a whole weekend to consult the almighty Rupiah Bwezani Banda. He then had, come up with 6 hours long blah…blah, that let loose without so much as a slap on wrist, one of Zambia’s most unscrupulous plunderer simply because the current plunder did not want a precedent set.

“ki mitolo-it’s taboo” – The reign of the village idiot.

The tone of discourse in Zambia has so riled my soul; I cannot bear it anymore.
The President is caught up in a “yo mama” like childish tirade with Michael Sata talking about whose more ugly than the other and the judiciary is forced to adjudicate whether breeched birth pictures are pornography or a sad telltale of the state of medical facilities in Zambia. Add a first lady collecting pay for work she is not doing and a monkey pissing on her husband during a press conference and you would have the script for a funny comedy but for the 12 million poor Zambians caught up in the middle of all this, all the time, every single day battling the effects of debilitating poverty.

I have always tried to hold our leaders in high esteem but when events so clearly betray that confidence, am reminded of an old proverb –
“a foolish man may be known by six things: Anger without cause, speech without profit, change without progress, inquiry without object, putting trust in a stranger, and mistaking foes for friends.”
President Rupiah Banda is angry at the media for exposing the people’s suffering during the recent strikes but rather than view himself as the leader elected or selected to resolve the problems in Zambia’s medical sector he has chosen to portray himself as the victim of an overzealous media. Pooh he moans incessantly about the Post manufacturing lies, pictures unless doctored almost never betray facts.
Culturally it has always been accepted that when women are pushed beyond social norms, baring all is the only nuclear protest move left, mama Chikamoneka did it before a British envoy, mothers have bared when their children leave them no recourse so why does the Zambian government prosecute a journalist for forwarding, the protest of woman whom our social net badly let down?
It’s a case of a fool getting angry if you ask me, where was the President for a week before this event unfolded. It’s always better to get ahead of a crisis, manage it, set the terms do not let the crisis set the terms for you but Rupiah Banda let the crisis evolve to the current specter – the whole world now laughs.
Rupiah Banda does not possess the knowledge nor is MMD party machinery structure comfortable near him, he still reeks of UNIP and it’s horrible tendencies, so he deals with any potential contenders for 2011 candidacy, by letting strangers/foes like Tentamashima and Mangani run them off with threats of violence.
The sad tale of a fool putting his blind faith in foes is all too obvious whether it’s Prof Clive Chirwa panning all his hopes on a few women singing “Chirwa uli wa mano (Chirwa you are intelligent)…ni iwe wine fye (you are the one)… presidential material.” when he joined the MMD in 2007 with hopes of making the MMD 2011 Presidential candidate or King Cobra thinking his “eagle eagle” boys will carry him to plot one. The truth has always been stirring wide eyed, poverty is a grim pathetic dehumanizing condition that makes any people say or behave however you please.
When captured through the lens of a camera however it is impossible to escape the fact that a child died because his would be breeched birth occurred during doctors/nurses; strike under the reign of the village idiot.
When Rupiah Banda suddenly found himself President of the republic of Zambia after the death of Mwanawasa, he quickly moved to make himself appealing to the MMD party machinery by increasing cabinet ministers and MP’s salaries – they were after all the primary king makers without them he could not have survived politically or otherwise. If Rupiah Banda has any real agenda to relieve the suffering of the Zambian people, it is hard to say right now, what is apparent is his desperate ploys to stay on in spite of his age and lack of wisdom to manage mundane crisis’s like a workers strike.

What would a wise leader do for the average Zambian woman, well he would or perhaps some day she will certainly save us from the horrible specter of a Zambian woman ever having to throw herself on the ground to welcome a politician at airport or having to give birth on the ground in public view. My soul sinks into despair when I hear tales of what women in childbirth had to endure during the nurse’s strikes, how can such cruelty ever unfold in my homeland. Many have been moved to tears by the retelling of the 2000 old nativity story, the birth of Jesus in a manger, how can a women in modern day Zambia suffer a more cruel fate?
The cruel irony is that Rupiah Banda was in South Africa getting his knee checked out, yet when he returns to Zambia he still fails to address the fundamental needs of Zambian women, he instead leads a government lynch mob in prosecuting a female journalist who dared to expose the sad plight of Zambian women.
Ovarian cancer has afflicted so many Zambian women, I applaud Maureen Mwanawasa for prevailing on her late husband to set up a cancer treatment center at UTH, I would readily forgive our current first lady for taking pay without work if she, would at least whisper to her husband to drop this sad case against the post female journalist.
But that’s all far fetched, it’s the reign of the village idiots, the discourse and central preoccupation is about Sata’s red eyes scaring kids and Sata for his part responds that he finds Rupiah Banda ugly and fat, the needs of the Zambian women will have to wait for now.

Dambisa Moyo's "Dead aid" - Africa's PR disaster

Dambisa Moyo is on a TV book promotion circuit appearing largely to audiences in the UK and the US, who are also Africa's most charitable benefactors and in some part Africa's most unscrupulous lenders.
Her appearances on TV, as her book attempt to call attention to the failure of some aid programs in parts of Africa, to lift the standard of living for most Africans to about half that those to whom she is selling her book "Dead Aid".


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While I agree that some aid programs have failed to meet their intended goals, I fear the narrative Dambisa's appearances and book has generated have now turn out to be a PR disaster for Africa and more specifically Zambia's charity program needs.

It may not be what Dambisa set out to do, but in this case the message and the messenger are gravely tainted. Dambisa has worked for the World Bank and Goldman Sachs in the past, if she views these two entities activities in Africa as charitable or aid, she may have taken to much boardroom cappuccino and whisk. Most of the 1 trillion Dollars she keeps bringing up was made out in interest loans to newly independent countries beginning in the 1960's.
It is important to remember the prevailing circumstances in much of Africa in the 50's
the rate of illiteracy, access to health care, clean water,decent housing, roads even food security etc. The status quo in Africa may seem out whack for Dambisa after her Wall street boardroom experience,but surely all money spent in Africa was not in vain. As a former Munali secondary school graduate, that spent a considerable amount of time learning in classrooms which we popularly called "World bank" because they were built with funds from a World Bank loan to the Zambian government, I take her generalization of mass aid failure with a pinch of salt.
It may be a case of where one is standing, while looking at the glass or in her case what she is selling, I wonder if she had worked with USAID or World vision instead of the World Bank, would she still have had the some perspective?. There are certainly, always better ways of spending money especially when looking at things in hindsight but "dead aid".

In Lusaka, Zambia for example Irish aid and Jica ( Japenese aid) programs to improve access to clean water in peri urban areas, have had more success than the impact of German loans to the Lusaka water sewage company to do the same. It important for Dambisa especially in her TV appearances to make a qualified distinction between aid funds and loans, she then needs to explain the difference in impact on Africa's social development.
Contributions to aid organizations like the Red cross, one world etc have already being negatively affected by the global financial crisis, Dambisa 's narrative of "dead aid" will do more harm to operations of aid organizations in Africa, especially now, when many need the most help.

Dambisa's book has put Africa's western benefactors in a difficult position, should they withhold aid until the last corrupt African government develops better structure for managing programs effectively or continue the much needed aid with the knowledge that, as Dambisa puts it, that it will be "dead aid". It is like the case of "two mothers and one baby" brought before king Solomon in the bible, Dambisa in her quest to sell her book, may have chosen to have the baby die rather than bear the risk ending up in the wrong hands.

The curse of illogical progression.

As did many people around the world, I start this year with a firm resolution to cut down expenditure and to save as much money as possible. The months ahead will be exceptionally challenging. The US economy lost more the 2.6 million jobs last year, yet unemployment is projected to hit double digits soon.
I have been desperate for any good news from home, to cheer the somber outlook, I keep hearing from President Elect Barack Obama. So imagine my discomfort at the pain and hubris that scream out from the article below.

“Police stop Chipata residents from slashing RB’s maize fields The Chipata Municipal council has suspended the slashing of maize on hill slopes until further notice .
The action follows the action by some Chipata residents who yesterday went amok and wanted to slash maize at President Rupiah Banda’s farm after Chipata Municipal Council slashed their maize fields.
Chipata mayor Sinoya Mwale said the council will not continue the program until it convenes a meeting with the affected residents.
Residents whose maize was slashed by the local authority yesterday went on rampage stoning a Hummer belonging to Chipata central Member of Parliament Lameck Mangani, a shop in Navutika and the house belonging to the mayor.
Quick action by Zambia Police who rushed to the area, prevented the irate residents that wanted to protest by slashing maize at the president’s farm.”

In the normal scheme of life, it is inconceivable that a municipal council that develops plans for land use and zoning, would ever find itself slashing the food crops of its impoverished residents, yet here we have all that and a GM Hummer in the picture.

There in lies the curse that affects many African nations, we have a vicious craving for modernity and luxury that can hardly be reconciled with poor circumstances.
Planning for one’s food needs is a basic and fundamental aspect of our existence; the municipal council in this case, should have designated a proportionate area for the growing of food crops. Yet the council and the legislative representative that have failed to establish these basic premises reward themselves, in the case of the representative with a Hummer- US 71,000, 9MPG, a gas guzzling SUV.
In the newly sworn US congress, there is a representative who sleeps, on a camp bed in his congressional office, to save his family and constituency money.
Zambia is projected to experience a food supply deficit this year, imagine how this US congressman would react, if the Hummer driving Zambian Member of Parliament should ever appear before him to appeal for food aid.
Ironically, the CEO of GM the makers of the Hummer had to dump his corporate jet and drove to Washington D.C in a hybrid car from Michigan, on his second visit to ask for a bailout.
As I, therefore, scale down my own expenditure, I wonder if others like the Member of Parliament Mr. Lameck Mangani might be considering scaling down too.