The President of the United States of America, Mr Donald J Trump was recently under some serious scrutiny from both international and local voices for referring to African Countries and Haiti as “****hole” in a recent meeting with USA officials. Initially I was outraged as were many Africans, statements were coming through from African leaders exhibiting not only dismay but outrage at the reported slur, I was more outraged about the fact that he referred to Africa as a country. I mean, if you are going to insult Africa, at least do it right.
A few days after the fact, I took a step back and looked at our great beautiful continent and realised that it is not all Roses and Zebras. Our Capital Lusaka was just hit with a Cholera outbreak, a disease that most countries have rid themselves of and is mostly prevalent in war zones and refugee camps where sanitation is not a priority but safety is, a disease of the dark ages preventable by cleanliness, sanitation and a good water supply, things that a 50-year-old country in the 21st century should not fail to provide its people with. Economic statistics from the UN show that 60% of Zambians live below the poverty line and 42% are in extreme poverty. A majority of our population are rarely delved into by the media both state and private due to their heavy concentration on the who’s who in the petty politics that drive this county.Also mostly because their existence is of no considerable importance to the dynamics of a country that has decided to confine itself along the line of rail, a population with no running water, no stable income, no electricity, that lives in huts and a has an extremely low standard of living. During election season you get to hear about all the problems faced by people from constituencies you’ve never even heard of and the multitude of promises our Politicians make to them but as soon as they enter office, well let’s just say million-dollar fire trucks become the priority. The “****hole” statement doesn’t seem farfetched after all.
Before I get labelled partisan, understand that I have lost all confidence in the current political dispensation and its players that govern it as being the key to our development and firmly believe a systemic redefinition of both our economic systems and political ideals will be the only way to change the face of this country and by extension this continent of ****hole countries. I have chosen to embrace the statement because constantly denying that we live in a ****hole country will only blind ourselves to the opportunity and zeal to change the status quo.
Why is Africa such a ****hole continent and by default Zambia?
Africa as always been the oxymoronic continent that is richly blessed with an abundance of natural resources but a population of poor individuals. Mubita C Nawa in his 2015 article on Lusaka Times echoed the view that many people outside Africa tend to have, that Africa is in its current poor state as a result of its own undoing citing poor leadership, dependency syndrome, jealousy, laziness and lack of self-belief as the 5 major reasons. I find his reasons laughable quite frankly, to cite jealousy and lack of self-belief as one of the reasons why one of the largest and resource rich continents is this poor is utterly ridiculous. I find the causes are more complex and systemic than a few retrospection notes one would make for themselves after reading a tritely written and generalised motivational book. I will outline a few views that I genuinely believe are the reason for our stagnation.
• Extrapolating form research by R Hausmann, a professor of economic development at Harvard, our inability to make complex products and dependency on exporting mainly raw materials reduces the ability to improve the country’s intellectual workforce, reduces the number of jobs by eliminating those that would have been created along the transition of the good from a simple raw material to a complex final good and it also reduces the additional income a country may have gotten from selling a finished rather than a raw or intermediate good. Countries like China are some of the biggest importers of raw and intermediate goods, no doubt they are one of the largest exporters of finished goods and funny enough, it exports some of them right back to Africa. It basically transformed itself into one big manufacturing hub, no wonder the Chinese are on a quest of world dominance. “Value Addition” has been a song that has been sung by politicians for a long time now but materialisation of it has been minimal, the exact opposite tends to be happening.
Here workers doing final touches to the strucure whose construction was stopped when it was at foundation level
Consumerism has become the order of the day with a proliferation of malls that have been selling finished goods made with raw materials mostly from their own countries of origin e.g. Dola Hill Mall in Ndola, a shopping mall owned and operated by the Chinese Individuals, selling Chinese goods with the benefit being only in the form of business taxes, hardly any income tax as a good number of their employees are below the tax bracket or the case of South African retail shops that offer little to no shelf space for Zambian products. Most of these malls are occupied by foreign shops that stock foreign goods. This was a fear echoed by a scholar from the London School of Economics in an article titled Why Zambia’s Mall Mania Poses Serious Problems for the Country’s Development
• Corruption, call it allegedly or not has taken deep root on the African continent. Transparency International indicated in one of its surveys indicated that African governments are incapable of providing the most basic of needs to its citizens such as running water because of corruption that trickles down from the top to the bottom of institutional hierarchy. The perpetuation of this corruption can be attributed to the nature of the political and legal framework in most of the countries, Centralisation of Power has rendered anti-corruption organisations such as the equivalent of ACC and also the Judiciary toothless and spineless in the execution of their duty due to the mere fact that no man ever dreams of biting the hand that feeds him. Their accountability switches from the people they swear to serve and instead to the people that gave them the opportunity to serve. Massive decentralisation is key to the crackdown of corruption with key organisation operating without influence from elected officials. The lack of such frameworks have left the Executive Branch of most governments across the continent accountable to no one but themselves. The mentality of “ukulyamo” is good in the short term for an individual but adversely affects the society in the long run.
• Trade and the entire economic system is designed for exploitation by foreign elements. Africa is rich in mineral resources, Zambia in particular sits on copper making it one of the top 8 producers of copper in the world, it also plays home to other valuable minerals, a beautiful scenery that can make an unenlightened tourist beg for double citizenship and is richly blessed with land and water that can feed an entire continent. This is a similar narrative for other African countries but regardless the continent continues to wallow in poverty. Collectively African countries are net creditors owing to the tune of 40+ billion dollars and Zambia’s debt alone has been rising at an alarming rate.2015 estimates show that about 160 billion dollars entered the continent and 203 billion was leaving in many forms
[pullquote]2015 estimates show that about 160 billion dollars entered the continent and 203 billion was leaving in many forms.[/pullquote]
The efflux of revenue from the continent is NOT largely facilitated by Multinational Corporations (MNCs) in the form of repatriations as is the case with influx but by under the table deals that span everything from cooked books in tax havens to illegal logging. About 30 billion dollars was stolen from the continent in the form of illegal logging, fishing and wildlife, 68 billion dollars in the form of tax misreporting by MNCs, 37 billion dollars in the cost of adapting and mitigating to climate change that is a result of industrialized country’s effect on the environment, these and other examples of wealth efflux in Africa leaves the continent a net producer of wealth not for its people but the for rest of the world.
Africa looks good on paper, generating ponderable amount of revenue, but sadly the benefit to the governments and its people is only marginal as most of the profits generated within the economies are repatriated, the loss is further exacerbated by low taxes for MNCs, tax incentives promised by the governments in their desperate search for foreign direct investment and MNCs’s use of tax havens. This is evident in which most of the money generated by the Zambian government is from income tax (e.g. PAYE) and taxes on its own people rather than from the existence and exploitation of its resources by foreign elements. Wealth is not being generated in the country because our natural resources keep being exploited by foreign elements, our home economy can play example to that where the government through institutions only owns between 5%-20% of the shares in industries such as mining and hardly any shares in some. Aid, Loans and Foreign Investors in a way perpetuate such systems in their demand for incentives to pour money into the country that leave governments with unfavourable concessions to make. Furthermore, the inability of governments to protect and shield their small and emerging industries leaves the country crippled. Most of the economic policies that have been pushed down the throat of African governments that encourage foreign investment and its liberalisation have been to the benefit of corporations that fund and lobby most of the political parties and institutions in western countries with little to no benefit for Africans themselves. There is need to promote policies that grow and nurture domestic companies as opposed to dependency on foreign direct investment, western countries never developed on foreign investments so I wonder why they push the agenda that it will help in Africa.
• Education and Brain Drain. Many parts of Africa have populations that are unable to access education with ease. Particularly, Zambian Journalists in their rare moments of glory have exposed certain parts of the country where children still learn under trees and have to cross rivers just to get to those trees, this lowers the child’s appreciation of his right to and benefit of education as some would rather enter the informal sector where a prospective substantial income is unlikely. The current state of our public schools in Zambia doesn’t address the skills and knowledge needed by a globally competitive graduate, most Undergraduate Degree holders prefer to further their studies abroad due to the low standard of education offered in the country where sadly most of them choose to never return from as they find better opportunities for personal development, this significantly costs the country in skilled labour, one of the major factors of production. A lot of home grown brilliant individuals are of benefit to overseas countries because of their under appreciation by their home countries.
• Religion and Spirituality in Africa has taken too much of a centre stage as opposed to reason and practicality. For the better running of government, a school of thought proposed the separation of religion and state for which most modern governments have adopted. This prevents the government on leaning on solutions that depend on people’s personal unsubstantiated belief as well as their faith, ties them to adhere to practicality, removes the invocation of religion as a reason why good and bad things are happening and makes the government a little more accountable and less manipulative. If a minister can come out and propose prayer as part of a solution to fight a disease or to encourage nimbus clouds to be more generous with that rain, know that your country’s ideologies are very backwards. Religion as an agenda is someone’s personal life but should never be put on a national one. Secondly the increase in Televangelists commonly known as Prophets in Africa have continuously fed and grew a mind-set that makes certain people entitled to economic prosperity as a form of disbursement for their faith and belief leading them to concentrate more on growing that falsely grounded belief as opposed to them making practical decisions about their finances.
Moving forward we need revaluate as a continent our economic models and position with foreign investors and aid. Promote policies that tie foreign companies to not only utilize local products but aid in bettering the quality of product and the efficacy with which it is produced, ridding ourselves of the ‘resource cruse’ where our economies are primarily focusing on extraction of resources and become a manufacturing hub, unity amongst countries and leaders with emphasis of trading blocs allowing the collective access to natural resources within Africa that will push the continental growth. The revocation of licenses for MNCs that operate or own subsidiaries in tax havens.
Conclusion
The list in not exhaustive as there exists a plethora of reasons why Zambia and Africa as a whole still largely remains underdeveloped.
Country men and women, we cannot pray away bad governance, bad policies, diseases and economic stagnation, we don’t need national days of prayer to develop this country. We need practical solutions, tougher and scrupulous leadership, new economic models, an educated nation not a praying. Haven’t we prayed enough or haven’t we been humble enough while we watch secular nations that don’t even care about religion take over our economies. The time to take action is now before we wake up 50 years into the future wallowing in debt and poverty, with no natural resource to speak of and an abundance of memories left by foreign investors that once roamed the country.
I am now mad again about the ****hole comment because now it’s the systemic exploitation of African countries by foreign corporation that have left these countries in the current state and their leader has no right to insult the state of something he indirectly or directly helps in destroying. Worse, the African leaders that are rebuking his statement are the same that perpetuate the corruption and ignorance that leaves the continent in its current damaged state.
By Toshiki Kucheba
You say you’ve lost interest in our political dispensation? Well why don’t you become president and use your advanced brains to turn things around? You’ve not given any solution other than spilling scorn at the African….I don’t know what you’re. Don’t take pride in European development, there people work hard, pay taxes, are patriotic, loyal to any sitting government by serving their countries diligently. They are mindful of their surroundings. If you do your part even the government will be wary of whatever they do, not innuendos. Development in Europe didn’t drop from heaven it came from the people themselves.
You seem touched nichani baba, did you read the the whole thing or you just saw the part about the government and the cadre in you got upset
Just tired of theorists. They told us things were going to improve if we remove KK but have they? We talk too much without solutions. Yes I am touched and really pissed off.
Honestly Ndanje
It is not easy to become president in Zambia because of the nature of our political environment. If you are a real threat, you will meet problems on your way. Not that easy. Mr Lungu is luck because ba sata left him to act. He could have left Guy but the constitution was not well interpreted.
I am not in government or a cadre. How many times did these people appear on television telling us how clever they were? Did they deliver? I don’t want to mention names, but we had these fellows with PhDs and fresh from overseas full of ideas. They became permanent secretaries and made money and disappeared from the scene. Some have either gone back to where they came from or are multi millionaires while Zambia took so many steps backwards.
Toshiki kucheba, name sounds Japanese, mr ndanje Japan is first world, the dude is just giving you free advise especially that you have electoral dysfunction.
@Juliet Perth, please don’t give up you never know what fate has for you. Even Edgar it wasn’t plain sailing sailing. Remember how the then vice-president tried to block him and abena GBM and company all wanted the same crown.
Hoooooooo …is that dirty picture Zambia?
I see why there is too much cholera.
Then who is gonna buy those dust covered veggies?
You can theorise all you like but in commercial world capital or cash is king. Without it you can do nothin even if you’re most intelligent or have all the copper. They are not called capitalists for nothing. Capital is created by ideas, hard work, integrity, productivity and spending on our own locally produced goods & services. It has to come from somwhere 1st. Every country grows like that. Its what makes difference between merely existing & prospering as nation. All this starts with you as individual. God will bless you with natural resources but learn to think long term & implement ideas. Work hard. Make integrity your nature & spirit of trust will spread. Gov’t isnt going to do it for you. Responsibility of govt is to encourage & facilitate all this. God Bless Zambia
The picture alone accurately points to Zambia as an indisputable %$#@HOLE. + the fact that there is what you people mistakenly call a government makes Trump’s description seem kind. That filth is what you get when your govt isn’t only a bunch of greedy thieves but who are also congenitally moronic. There simply isn’t a word in all dictionaries that can adequately describe this type of stup@!dity that afflicts Zambia.
Sit down, Roses and Zebras, WTF!
You spend the whole day writing this stup!d article and that’s why Africa is poor
As if we even need reminding of all that is wrong with us. It is ourselves and how we are imprisoned in mindset by the very people we put in power. African Leaders want to own everyones mind and force them to think like them and praise them at all times. The failure to espouse free thinking and self determination is our biggest problem. I am also afraid we have not taken religion (Christianity well) our destiny as a country is all but surrendered to the fate we believe God has prepared for us and unfortunately from our own slave traders to colonialists to our current leaders .. our own people have abused this to our own detriment 🙁
Christianity is Beautiful and Dutiful and pragmatic unfortunately we have misunderstood it and surrendered our control of externalities to it
We have accepted the wrong things being perpetuated by our leaders as something that will eventually be resolved and punished on judgement day as mere mortals continue to plunder our resources and Integrity. Moreover we already insist that Leaders are from God…. so how is someone anointed by God (who is always and forever good) can mean ill to us? Thus as they buy fire engines at USD 1 million, it is all good those questioning are committing a sin for the leader chosen by God declared that this was a wise purchase. As he amasses wealth which is unexplained in a short 1 year; it is Gods giving to this humble Soul whom he has chosen…..@ Ndanje, you need to recognize that citizens in Europe thrive and work harder and pay taxes because those in Power exercise a more just approach to…
contd….
to resource distribution and provide a fairer governance system
Shameless
Good one boi. True Christianity as a religion has not helped us. The bible is clear “ believe and have faith in God” but the level we take these matters is beyond Paul. If Paul were here, he would come and reprimand us. “A good Christian is a good Citizen” basically a good Christian must work hard. All faithful men and women in the bible worked hard. But our Christianity is more about miracles.
This by no means scientific but I feel 70% of Africa’s problems are a direct result of its politicians/populace while foreign actors make up the remaining 30%. The ball is in our court and we are constantly dropping it. We are so weak, shortsighted and disorganized that its only natural that foreign agents will take advantage of the situation.
You very right brethren
I have lived in Australia for 12 years and I tell you one thing we can do better than these west people. Africans are intelligent and over here are hard working. Their (west) strength is in the rule of law and everything else follows behind. As for us our weakness is rule of man (president followed by his followers).
You very right brethren
I have lived in Australia for 12 years and I tell you one thing we can do better than these west people. Africans are intelligent and over here are hard working. Their (west) strength is in the rule of law and everything else follows behind. As for us our weakness is rule of man (president followed by his followers). .
Wealth is not leaving Africa because of big multinational companies. They are bringing it into the continent to build businesses, generate employment and have thriving, sustainable development. LEGALLY!
The money that is leaving the continent is stolen money, stashed away in tax havens like Panama by corrupt thieves that call themselves “leaders” to hide it away from the people they are stealing it from!
Olusegun Obasanjo is personally responsible for stealing not millions, but BILLIONS of Dollars of Nigerian taxpayers money, all hidden away in places like Switzerland, who are now giving it back to Nigeria.
The only way we can move forward is with accountable, transparent Governments that can be questioned by Freedom of Information laws and a free press to report it.
No…
The only way we can move forward is with accountable, transparent Governments that can be questioned by Freedom of Information laws and a free press to report it.
No surprise Lungu and his PF closed down The Post! No surprise Lungus first trip was to Mugabe who has also stashed millions from stolen diamonds around the world. No surprise Lungu never gives press conferences, and anyone that dares question his fantastic newly found wealth get harrassed by the PF police!
The root cause is the privatisation crooks who have hidden the privatisation loot in the paradise papers and that’s the issue at hand…
Zambia and Africa at larger can’t develop, this is due to African continent has a shaped symbol like question mark (?) So It can’t be and won’t be developed.
”If a minister can come out and propose prayer as part of a solution to fight a disease or to encourage nimbus clouds to be more generous with that rain, know that your country’s ideologies are very backwards”
Imagine, in this age and era…ati let’s have national prayers to eradicate a stone age diseases associated principally with fifth. What kind of governance is this…..
Of all the things outlined in the article, I am not convined I have read one that exactly addresses any causes of poverty in Zambia. They are all effects, symptoms, consequences of a fundamental underlying problem – bad governance of a failed state of Zambia
Yes, maggotes, flies, scavengers are feasting and canabalising the broken down Statecraft and government machinery – brokendown bodyframr, broken down mechanical system, broken down
power sources,electrical and electronic system! Do we need drivers, captains, or pilots to opearete a broken dowm system? Hell no! First things first.
We have a supposedly republican republican governance system that is run like a kingdom, an empire. We should have a democratic country, but governed as an autocracy, in a despotic manner.
Come…
Lusaka Times, give this writer a larger platform. Toshiki, a voice like yours is missing from media outlets across the world.
Poverty in Africa and especially in Zambia is due to a thieving leadership, period.
Firstly, great article there Toshiki Kucheba. I agree with you on the issue of the broken, crippled and priority – deficient governance system that is practised by our ‘leaders’. What do we expect in a country that has leaders who are only accountable to their political bosses but busy telling citizens that power is in their hands? Which citizen would allow wastage of $42 billion when their universities have no equipment, their water has faecal matter?
The problem is that these politicians think they are all knowing and rubbish anyone who says the inverse of what they deem right. As a nation we have chosen to be political in all we do, we don’t measure great ideas that are the opposite of those we have based on merit but see a political party in every statement.
Nevertheless,…
Nevertheless, it’s not too late, we can get back to the drawing board and sort out our priorities. An example would be to stop defining development in terms of malls which have only served as selfie – taking centers for youths with camera phones and try to concentrate on investing in productive endeavours like education, industrialisation, Agriculture and the oversung song of value addition.
True name? Toshiki Kucheba????
wonderful thinking…I like the ” televangelist” part .., more so because this particular topic infuriates me
…busy shouting ‘ I receive ‘ and waiting on miracles, even the bible admonishes us to work hard if we are to taste of what’s good
The biggest problem I think is mindset. We Africans have been brought up to go to school and work. The education system we inherited from the colonialists ensured that. Tell me, how come grade 12 level Indians and Lebanese come to Zambia and open factories while we rush to them for jobs, is that the government’s fault??? I don’t think so, it is largely our cultural problem as a people. And we continue to tell our children, the next generation, the same. Yes bad governance and corruption have negative effects but why are we not opening factories, why are we not dominating businesses?? Because we are wired to be employees not employers. When the Asians and South Americans broke this mindset and told themselves they are equal with the westerners, that’s how they broke from poverty. But…
…look at our diaspora, happy to work for the white man, exposed to advanced technology but have failed to drive industry in their own countries-want to blame government again????
Besides it’s fellow Africans who are conniving with the imperialist investors to loot the continent. This group is aware how”ignorant” our presidents are. Some of even aspire for high office. I remember how after nationalizing the mines turned against KK and how Anglo pulled out of Zambia when their blue eyed got wallopoed by Levy.
Nice piece of writing Kucheba. “The current state of our public schools in Zambia doesn’t address the skills and knowledge needed by a globally competitive graduate…” Our education system needs an overhaul. The ‘normalisation’ of leakages and cheating in our public schools is taking our education standards down. It should be strongly dealt with, this is where corruption-tolerant thinking starts. We need to instil very strong values in our citizens at a tender age, and create a consequential culture.
Moreover, we continually produce citizens from our schools with no sense of patriotism because national values (if at all we have any) are not emphasized or taught.
One point that sticks out like a swollen nose is the one from the Havard researcher. Surely our inability to make COMPLEX products inhibits us in many ways. Couple this with mindsets etc, and you have a good understanding of why copper is not exploited like say ZAFFICO timber is. On the CB, there a lot of saw mills scattered everywhere. We should have the same for copper with little smelters, little concentrators and little refineries ( like Ndola Copper Refinery was) everywhere ( albeit the investments are more).
@Engineer: govt banned the export of scrap and ores in the hope locals could set up micro smelters. Guess what?? Zambians are in the forefront smuggling copper scrap out of Zambia, like mukula…sad indeed, like I said: MINDSET.
Its time we stop complaining about the past, we know the problems, we know the solutions. We must have fearless leaders who stand up for what they believe and whats best for their people. The west fears a leader who stands up to them and that’s why they assassinate and send economic hitmen to cause confusion. We must unite, accept we have much to catch up on and promote professionalism in all we do. Corruption and professional misconduct is an enemy to development. We must not politicize everything, allowing cadres and uneducated individuals in positions of power, who are selfish and lack respect for law and order with little or no exposure on how an organised society works (Not intended to offend anyone). Lets encourage an organised society, let doctors do what doctors do, accountants,…
Tell me Juzz, have cpmpared the qualifications of PF mps and opposition mps??? If you did, you wouldn’t have posted what you did. The problem is the negative and fake news phenomenon sweeping the world that has twisted yout mind into believing PF are a bunch of uneducated cadres who can’t run govt. Even the Pope highlighted the fake news problem yesterday. Do your research before you comment.
You see, you are politicizing my statement. My comments meant no disrespect anyone. Africa and other third world countries are in the trap of poverty. And as I mentioned above, we have the solution. This isn’t targeting any specific government nor their governing policies. Look at past African leaders who stood up to the western influence, Thomas Sankara, Patrice Lumumba… etc… these attempted to challenge the west by challenging the trade rules and agreements to encourage their own people to produce, trade and set their own terms, look how they turned out, assassinated. The article in general speaks of why we are still poor, as Zambia and a continent, not that we are led by a government not doing what they should do. My comments relating to people unqualified to carry out certain…
“…We must not politicize everything, allowing cadres and uneducated individuals in positions of power, who are selfish and lack respect for law and order with little or no exposure on how an organised society works (Not intended to offend anyone)…” Kindly explain….
Before I answer your question let me ask you a question, what are the differences between third world governments and first world governments? In your reasoning point out simple point answers for easier debate. Then I can explain my statement.
@zambian citizen: I agree with you on mindset – that is why i was not comfortable with the authors disparaging comments on Mubita Nawa’s book -or even why he quoted the book actually.
I know some ” well off” business people that I have wondered how come they were comfortable with their money made from ” consultancy” but do not use that money to set up such factories – like Indians in Zambia do. Actually many rich Zambians are quite comfortable to own Hardware shops, big busses , but not industry, like we had with Shonga Steel of the yester years.