I hope the BOZ will extend its financial and Forex movements in not only processing markets but also goods and money markets. If supermarkets like shoprite, Game store, PnP,PEP etc have been repatriating all the profits to their home countries, this time around it must be brought to a serious control. These chain stores should be made to save with any local bank and not a foreign Bank whose servers and control systems are in their home countries.

Again Bank Of Zambia should really scrutinize all the movements of Foreign Exchange and a limit of this financial out flight should be limited to a certain amount with a valid reason like payoff the debts or humanitarian reasons. I know some Zambians are very skeptical with this move, but i wish to tell you that Forex and Financial controls have been in existence in many counties like USA, Britain, South Africa etc.No one is allowed to send cash abroad any how without valid reasoning. Certain firms and companies will be gravely affected especially those fully in tax evasion system, mostly by over-bloating the costs against revenues so that they seem to be just breaking even or accruing losses. This time all those finances to be used to pay off loans or any other transaction by these investors will have to be checked.

Prudency in financial management and fiscal policy by the central government must not only mean the wellness in collecting and disbursement of tax, but also the way finances are retained and utilized in the all the financial perimeters which includes Foreign Exchange market. It also entails taking into account and controlling all the finances flowing out of this country. There shouldn’t be freeness in financial repatriation by these investors. Benefits of this Move (in summary) (a) Economic Growth and Development Zambia government has been struggling in organizing funds to develop this country even from the mining sector.

Once the companies start depositing their cash with our local banks, we expect the saving rate to rise hence increase the bank’s ability to provide loans to the citizens of this country at reduced interest rates. Part of these finances will certainly be used for small and medium scale investment which has direct bearing on the level of employment. Since many firms and financial institutions will be involved, the economic activities will certainly increase and this will push up the economic growth and thereby economic development. But this will certainly depend on the financial prudency of the government in allocating the resources. (b) Foreign Exchange Market Improvements Again the much expected benefit is the likelihood of the Zambian Kwacha to appreciate.Currently, despite recording trade surpluses due to mainly huge mineral revenues, very little has found itself on the local foreign exchange to provide an economical cushion to the depreciating Kwacha.

Therefore, when the Bank of Zambia is mandated to directly control the forex movements from this country to the economies in the dispora, it will certainly store enough foreign Exchange in the reserves which can be used to take care of Deteriorating Kwacha. (c) Minimize Worker Exploitation Besides, this move will reduce some level of exploitation of workers in the country. We have been facing labour conflicts between employers and employees more especially on wage adjustments. Employers will mostly declare losses to the state in order to qualify their refusal for any salary increase.

And the government fails to prove this because all the profits by these foreign investors are kept outside the country. But once profits are saved in the local banks, the government will easily detect the falsehood and mendacity in the employers. Our poorly paid workers will certainly start having good deals with their employers. (d) Reduce tax evasion and improve country’s fiscal position Finally, the move will reduce almost all tactics of tax evasion by the investors since the state will be monitoring the movements of cash and amounts of profits being made by the many investors.

With reduced tax evasion, the government will experience a fair rise in tax collection, hence improve the fiscal standing of the nation and this will help in sectoral financing. Thank you. The writer is an Economist and Master of Business Administration Student and Copperbelt University (The in-depth analysis will be found at www.sokoedmond.wordpress.com very soon for reference. For any question and additions use [email protected])

It’s sad see a big organisation like ZAMPOST being run like a small shop (Kantemba).

To explain this,the company makes a lot of money, but we the workers who work very hard to make the same money under very difficult conditions are subjected to very poor working conditions. What we the workers get is too little as compared to the effort we put in. The language we hear when we talk of salary increment and improved conditions of service is that there is no money.

If there no money,where do they take the money to?. In addition, Working hours were adjusted upwards from 08:00-16:30 to from 08:00-18:00 during week days and from 08:00-14:00 on Saturdays but no overtime is paid. As this is not enough management has also imposed on us to be working even on public holidays.

If I may ask ,when are we going to do our personal pieces of work and rest if this is the case? The UNION we belong to is supposed to be our mouth piece in protecting our interests as workers against bad managerial tendencies but this is not the case. The work place has been turned in to an animal farm such that those who seem to stand up and defend their rights as workers, are intimidated of being shown an exit door.

Furthermore the UNION instead of siding with us workers is compromised and has been weakened such that management is performing a duo role of that being a union and management.

We have nowhere to run to except to you Tumfweko and other electronic media to convey the message on our behalf to the powers that be before the company goes under. Besides the infrastructure(buildings) are extremely dirty and furniture in all Post Offices around the country is dilapidated as such we are not proud workers.Please help me post this on your website so that the government knows about this in case they are not aware of such happenings in ZAMPOST and that bloggers can blog. Let me end here.

Demotivated worker.

Yet all Indian employees are contracted and enjoy benefits such as company cars, with KR 1,500  worth of monthly fuel, housing and child education. The Zambian employees who labor daily for the good of the company get nothing but a basic pay, no transport, accommodation or medical aid.

This Tuesday 26th March 21, 2013. Netone has invited  vice president Mr. Guy Scott to the opening of its newest investment, NDATA. What good is the investment that does not benefit the locals?

What’s the ministry of labour doing to help the poor Zambians. I worked for a week before retiring; the company still owes me for my last week at the company.

I visited my former neighborhood Lubuto West in Ndola recently and I wasn’t impressed with what I saw. Besides the road the MMD worked on their way out, there is nothing to write home about.

I couldn’t believe the Lubuto Public Library has been closed for years now. When I decided to dig a little information on the MP for Kabushi Constituency under which Lubuto West falls, I found out that the area MP is a 51-year-old widow named Dorothy Mupeta Kazunga. According to the information on National Assembly website, this honorable MP only went as far as Form Two in her education.

Let’s be honesty people. Was this the best candidate PF could come up with in the September 2011 general elections?

Was it possible for a Form Two like Ms Kazunga to scoop the Kabushi Constituency seat if she stood on the MMD ticket or any other party?

It is clear people where voting for a party and not the person standing. How do you expect a Form Two to represent you in parliament? How can a form two articulate issues pertaining to good governance? Can someone like her call the Councillor and make a directive? Your guess is as good as mine.

I doubt whether this lady has even visited her area since she got elected. But I think I understand why there is little development in Kabushi Constituency and why the public library is closed. How do you expect a Form Two to appreciate educational facilities like a library.

But what hurts much is the fact that after her term, this lady will still collect her gratuity regardless of doing nothing for her constituency.

By MK.

We wonder what kind of dogs wears our police uniforms.

We do not agree with Moses Wesley Chibambo’s life style (we need not), and his political choices, but that citizen deserves to be treated with respect like every one of us.

If that singer has committed any offence, let him be prosecuted and eventually punished without being subjected to that kind of humiliation and torture.

The police should understand that their role in the society is not to punish people they are holding in custody. For heaven’s sake you goons your job is to investigate allegations of crime. It is the duty of the judge to punish people who have been found guilty after going through a due process of the law.

How can you start cutting suspects’ hair because just because they prefer to maintain a hairstyle different from your bald heads?

So how many times if Dandy Crazy going to be punished for one crime if at all he committed the crime he is facing? If the police officers are already meting punishment before the accused is pronounced guilty, what will the court do?

If the court handling that case has any sense of justice, Dandy Crazy should be released and set free immediately.

We can just imagine the level of abuse that was going on when he was been shaved. The Zambia police should learn to be civilised and stop abusing suspects. This is simply wrong even in the sight of God and in the face of international human rights.

It is torture and assault to cut someone’s hair without his consent. Do those barbarians have an idea how much Chibambo has invested to maintain that hair for them to just cut it like that?

There is nothing that can justify the behaviour of the police to mistreat a person who is in their lawful custody that like that.

In a civilised society, the head of the police himself would have resigned in the face of such a scandal and those beasts who carried out the actual would be the ones behind bars.

But then this is the country where bullying of weaker members of society is encouraged by the powers that be. The police do such things because they know their superiors endorse it.

We generally expect very little from the Zambia police in terms of professionalism, but even with that low expection, we are still appaled by this kind of inhumanity and backwardness

I just want to reflect on the current president heart for this country when he was in opposition:

1. 2001 PF lost and it was a clean loss 2.2006 PF lost and it was not a clean loss and people were ready to go on the street to fight for their justice. However the PF president Micheal Sata stopped them and said let us swallow a bitter pill as we have only one Zambia.

There was peace in the country ,not because of the police but because of the responsible Micheal Sata. 3. 2008 PF lost and this was really a hot one. The whole country wanted to go on the street and some even started in Mandevu and copperbelt province.

PF leader again stopped the violence and there was calm in the nation. One question I ask myself is that can HH,Nevers Mumba, Elias Chipimo do that??? HH and Nevers are on record of causing violence and even campaigning outside Zambia that we the people we suffer. Let us see through the heart of our would be leaders before we give them big support. I wish MC all the good health and long life.

Too sad many people have been denied this chance because schools fees. And we could be grateful towards PF government if it had looked in this matter by providing  us with a platform to learn, grow and enrich ourselves. Vice president of Zambia, please don’t politicizing education as a tool for election campaign, remember  it is the future of the every child in Zambia.

We know your children’s go to better schools in Zambia or abroad and they usually write different exams from poor Zambian child. I urge people of Zambia lets open our eyes and analyze what comes to ears. If you said to the all Zambians it could have been better but you talked to the voters in Mpongwe constituency then it does not concern every Zambians your manifesto is fake  am al a patriotic man but don’t fool us.

Dear Editor,

I am a Zambian girl studying medicine(MBBS) in china and I would like to share my story of how an agent who is bringing students to china is telling lies and taking money from the students who go to him. I  came to china in march 2011, using an agent called pastor Justin Likuka from Ndola an  his company is called JBL.

My friend and I went to him after being introduced by another friend. He told us to choose the school from a list he gave us, he told us how good it was and all crappy lies, we paid him alot of money for his services. When we arrived at the school in china called jiujiang university to our shock it was nothing like he spoke of, a few months later we discovered that the school was not accredited to teach MBBS, it was all a business deal between him, a Chinese and a Pakistan man.We researched and found a better school and applied, but moving to the school was not easy.

They refused to give us a refund  after paying $5700 of school fees each and we went through some visa issues. In china if a school is small and not accredited, the government does not allow it to bring foreigners but for business Chinese workers there do that,the Zambian embassy is not even aware that there are students there therefore people who graduate cannot work as doctors because the education there is very poor and fake ,their certificates are also fake,its just for business.

I am sharing  my story so that people in Zambia should not make the same mistake, so far according to the Zambian embassy in China 6 students graduated from such schools and they went back to Zambia but could not work, right now 3 students that man brought to another bad school came back to Zambia recently after discovering this. As I am writing this he has just brought in 5 students here, he came with them,and he will be taking them to a bad school, but they do not know anything.please publish  this story so that all Zambians who want to come to china should use proper means of coming to a good school.

It is so disappointing that Government has been so selective in making efforts to enhance operations and functions of some of its departments in an effort to deliver services to the general public.

While it is appreciated that some departments are given priority because of the critical role they play in running affairs of Government, some other important ones have still been neglected to the extent of even neglecting officers in those departments.

Forestry Department is one such a Government department that has been neglected so much not only by the current Patriotic Front Government but also other previous Governments that were in power before.

The most critical issues contributing to non effectiveness of the department include erratic and inadequate funding to the department for its operations which has affected mostly District Offices in all the provinces of the Country where the office of the Forestry exist. However, the Minister of Lands, Natural Resources and Environmental Protection has tried to support the department by promoting tree planting after a very long time of about over 20 years though with bad timing and lack of proper advise from forest professionals at Forestry Headquarters.

Secondly the non restructuring of the department cannot pass without any comment. Officers are still under old conditions of services making them among Government officers that are paid very low salaries.

Why should a situation where under the same Government but in different ministries, some officers are paid higher salaries while others are paid very low salaries yet they hold the same qualifications for the jobs they do, be tolerated?

The Government must show some seriousness in addressing some of these serious anomalies which have made certain ministries become non effective with demotivated officers.

Government cannot fail to secure funds for restructuring such smaller departments if it managed to restructure bigger ones like health. This cannot go on without mentioning that it is very much possible that some money meant to commence the restructuring of Forestry Department could have been released by Government but might have been diverted by unscrupulous leaders within the Government system.

I therefore wish to call upon His Excellency, President Michael Chilufya Sata to develop interest in the matter and follow it up critically because Forestry Department is an important department which plays a vital role in conserving the country’s environment.

Deforestation is increasing at an alarming rate with over 300,000 hectares been degraded annually in Zambia. It’s up to the Government to ensure that the department is fully funded as well as officers are paid accordingly especially that the Government recently conducted Job valuations in all ministries. I only hope that there will be a good report out of it and that as they start negotiating for good conditions of service for public workers, a positive result shall come forth.

The other area to be looked at is the issue of having district offices run by officers with different qualifications whereby at one district, its run by a degree holder while at another district, it’s run by a Classified Daily Employee even when there is someone with better qualifications.

I hear that the Minister of Lands, Natural Resources and Environmental Protection will be presenting the Bill for restructuring the department in Parliament and only hope that every meaningful Member of Parliament will be able to support it.

Forestry Department Staff.