PF Nkana member of parliament Alexander Chiteme says civil servants expending budget money approved in Parliament are the ones behaving like monkeys in a maize field.

And Chiteme says a good number of civil servants are doing better than members of parliament because of theft.

Speaking during the PF interactive forum in Lusaka today, Chiteme said misappropriation of public funds would not end until there was a drastic change of the current civil service.

He said most misappropriations reported in the Auditor General’s report were by civil servants yet politicians were the ones receiving the backlash.

“Who stole the money at the Ministry of Education as reported in the Auditor General’s report? Is it the Minister of Education? The civil servants working in those government ministries, the people in charge of expending those budgets we are approving in Parliament, are the ones behaving like monkeys in a maize field; stealing resources meant to educate our children but where does the buck stop? On the politician,” Chiteme said.

He said the current generation of “monkeys in the maize fields” needed to be replaced with professional people with a heart for the people.

Chiteme said civil service reforms were expensive.

He alleged that civil servants were living better than members of parliament and that most stylish houses in Chalala residential area were owned by those in the civil service.

“If you go in Chalala, you will find houses built in Nigerian style and if you ask for the owner, you will hear it is the accountant in education ministry,” Chiteme said.

He said failure to punish the offenders had exacerbated the scourge and called for urgent reforms in the civil service to root out corruption.

“We can change government today, we have changed government before; from UNIP into MMD, from MMD into the current government of PF. What we have not changed drastically is the civil service,” said Chiteme. “It is the same civil service that was in Kaunda government, the same that was in MMD government, same civil service that is working in this government.”