Without any doubt, one of President Hakainde Hichilema’s flagship projects is obviously the Constituency Development Fund (CDF) which his administration has increased from a paltry K1.6 million to a whopping K25.7 million!
When making the earth-shattering announcement, the President famously said, “We’re taking the money away from a small number of big thieves in Lusaka and bringing it closer to the people in order to enhance development!”
What do we make of this?
If applied prudently, CDF can obviously be a game changer! Previously, we had a few individuals congregating in air-conditioned offices in Lusaka remotely deciding how much money should be allocated for particular projects in given constituencies without necessarily taking into consideration the order of priorities. Apart from the money ending-up in the pockets of a few selfish individuals through over pricing, most projects couldn’t be completed, hence robbing our people of development.
In his insatiable desire to spur development activities in every corner of the country, this particular President has applied wisdom by increasing CDF, exponentially. While the Edgar Lungu regime would literally ‘starve’ opposition strongholds of CDF by withholding funds or releasing the same in bits and pieces, the current administration has departed from such a warped way of thinking by making the money available in all the constituencies at the same time.
Kudos to Hon. Gary Nkombo, the Minister of Local Government & Rural Development for not being a let down on this score! He’s definitely doing whatever it takes to help implement the vision of President Hichilema – rolling out bursaries to deserving students, ensuring that classroom spaces are being increased and no child is having to sit on the floor, feeder roads are being worked on and citizens are getting empowered economically.
However, while some MPs have taken this initiative in stride and are busy spearheading developmental initiatives in their constituencies according to the needs of our people; a number of them are either still trapped in denial or completely avoiding to be associated with CDF for whatever reasons! Why should you continue punishing citizens in such a manner? This is not only grossly unfair but totally unjustifiable! And such individuals don’t deserve to sit in parliament at all.
Like everyone else, we have been following the good news coming out of Kanchibiya with keen interest. As they say, “seeing is believing,” we intend to make a trip to Kanchibiya to take stock of how Hon. Sunday Chanda is utilising CDF in this rural constituency. We shall seek to engage the relevant stakeholders to appreciate their views or concerns on this matter. From there, we hope to tour a few more constituencies to equally ‘investigate’ or assess the impact of CDF in our communities.
Honourables Brian Mundubile, Steven Kampyongo, Jay Jay Banda, Munir Zulu, Jean Chisenga Given Katuta, Anthony Mumba, Shakafuswa, Miles Sampa …..the list is of course endless, it would be great to be acquainted with your exploits in your respective constituencies.
Please, make a date!
Prince Bill M. Kaping’a
Political/Social Analyst
HH has chosen to spend people’s money on the people themselves and that is a key criterion in how you judge how good a government is.
Spending it on Driving lessons is utterly wasteful
One has to wonder who decided this rediculous decision
We need tradesmen !!!
Some people do work as drivers and do need to be given proper training to drive different size vehicles to be safe on the roads there are to many fatal accidents everyone should be trained for the job they do they are also worthy. Good investment.
The CDF is controlled by the central government now as was reported recently when they gave out some money to Vubwi and other 2 constituencies.
This is good for o avoid evil plans by some people.