Government has started airlifting relief maize for affected people in Chikwashya and Mbilisao areas of Nyimba district in eastern province.
District Commissioner Alexander Miti, told ZANIS in a telephone interview that the airlifting of 400 by 50 Kilogramme bags of relief maize to the two areas started yesterday.
“We are hopeful that 100 bags will be airlifted today though the exercise will not be completed until next week,” he said.
The District official said the maize stocks destined for Chiwashya and Mbilisao had been marooned at the boma since March because the two areas could not be accessible by road.
Mr Miti said the district was handicapped with transport due to the poor road network leading to the two areas and had recently appealed for government’s intervention through the Disaster Management and Mitigation Unit.
He disclosed that the district was permitted to distribute 2, 000 bags of maize out of which 400 were to be distributed in Mbilisao and Chikwashya areas.
“We managed to distribute 1,600 to other parts of the district but we were stuck with the 400 that were meant for the two areas,” he said.
The district commissioner has since appealed to government to rehabilitate the road infrastructure to ease transport in the district.
He said it was disheartening that teachers working in Mbilisao and Chikwashya schools spent four days on the road to get their monthly incomes from banks in Petauke district.
“These people spend time and money on the road in order to get their salaries in Petauke because they have no bank facilities in Nyimba,” he said.
ZANIS/ENDS/HN/SJK
Maize is just being harvested and we are talking of giving people free food now, why? That maize was supposed to be distributed in March when people did not have enough food not this time when they have plenty. This MMD is nauseating the way they operate. Lives have already been lost because of failure to send to send that maize at the time it was needed. Does it mean it is relief dsitribution through out the year? We have ver lazy and dormant people in zambia and that country will never develope when we promote culture of handouts
I think the major problem is FRA. It is just there as a conduit for theft. I mean it should not exist at all. My contention has always been that we need to have what FRA does at district level under ministry of social welfare. They’re the ones who should distribute inputs to recognised groups with the help of chiefs as doing so would expose undeserving culprits since the chiefs will keep a record of who their subjects are. That will even remove a situation where officials & some politicians share the bags before they give the beneficiaries. Why should we have shortage of maize when the funding has been increasing yearly? Local government should take up the other part of feeder roads and storage facilities while NCZ is recapitalised so that we stop promoting foreign firms thru imports..