Doctors who participated in last week’s operation to separate seven month old conjoined twins, who shared a liver, have expressed shock at the manner in which UK based medical expert Larry Mweetwa attempted to demean their achievement.

Mr Mweetwa, on Friday, stated that performing an operation on Siamese twins is nothing to celebrate as the procedure was as now as simple as performing circumcision.

Neurosurgeon Dr Kachizya Sichinga said the 30 member medical team that successfully performed the operation is shocked by Mr Mweetwa’s assertions.

The team comprised Prof Lupando Munkonge, Prof Tackson Lambert, Dr Chadwick Ngwisha and Prof Sultanov. Other include Senior doctors Prof James Munthali, Dr Penuis Tembo and Dr Mulondi Mwanahamutu.

The front line surgeons, led by Dr Bruce Bvulani also include Dr Robert Zulu, Dr Vernon Vernon M Pashi and Dr Mulenga Mulewa, Dr Dilbur and Dr Brown-Oranmore Ray.

Anesthesia was led by Dr Christopher Chanda, Dr Feruza Ismailova, Dr Dildora, Dr Sompwe, Dr Zubair and Dr Mumpasha.

Theatre Sisters were are led by CNO Josephine Chimpinde, Sister Peggy Mashikati, Rebecca Kamboyi, Lucy Nampungwe, Felix Kamuchungu and Yvette Chulu while the floor staff included Richard Siambilu and Gift Mudenda.

Dr Sichizya said the nation must celebrate the surgeons and every level of cadres who were involved in this operation and continue to pray for the quick recovery of the twins.

Below is Dr Sichizya’s statement

What is so “s**thole” about the Medical Practitioner?

The rather derogatory word “s**thole”, reported to have been uttered by one major World leader has been taken to another level by another gentleman.

Whereas this gentleman’s analysis about the surgery to separate the Siamese Twins was almost acceptable, given he had not fully comprehended the extent of the operation as he insisted it only involved intestines(you may read Mulindi Mwanahamuntu’s writeup for a better understanding of the whole operation), it was his diatribe against the Medical Practitioner that has left many of us shocked.

What is so “s**thole” about a medical practitioner?

I have read and re-read his posting and still don’t seem to understand how this got into his otherwise reasonably researched writing, especially that the media and the public in general have given credit to everyone who participated in this operation.

The Zambian society generally gives respect to doctors. To get into medical school anywhere in the world is challenging. It was even more difficult in Zambia a few years ago when there was only one medical school that picked less than 50 students from hundreds competing to get into 3rd year. These were further vetted until only 30 made it to become doctors. Only the creme de la creme made it to the finish line.

This is the reason the Zambian trained doctors tend to shine when they go into the diaspora to further their careers. It is because the panel-beating they receive during their training is second to none, despite the many challenges in terms of equipment.

Thankfully, the Government of Zambia through the MOH has worked very hard to improve the provision of medical services by acquiring modern equipment and encouraging Specialist Training through the STP program which is starting this week(And I am so excited about It!).

We celebrate the surgeons and every level of cadres who were involved in this operation and we continue to pray for the quick recovery of the twins.

Prior to the surgery, weekly Inter-disciplinary meetings involving diverse experts were held to plan for this operation. These included surgeons, paediatricians, radiologists, anaesthetists, pharmacists, nurses, nutritionists, social workers and spiritual directors and many more, under the expert care of The Women and Newborn HOSPITAL Senior Medical Superitendant Dr Chisembele.

Dr Mwanahamuntu chaired the meetings. Dr Gen. Adrian Maleya, the consultant radiologist from Zambia Army guided the team from the imaging point of view, maybe one of the most crucial components of the planning process.

The MOH gave significant support and they are commended highly.

This operation might have been done in other African countries, but this one is ours! Indeed in any match, you will normally only cheer when the home team scores. The Home Team has scored a major goal! Zambia, We celebrate. Glory be to God.

Vodafone Zambia has appointed Amon Jere as its new Chief Sales and Distribution Officer with effect from February 1, as part of the 4G operator’s drive to expand and fortify its distribution footprint and grow market share.

Mr Jere, whose previous role was as Chief Sales & Distribution Officer at MTN Zambia Limited, has over 15 years of international leadership in commercial, sales and distribution within the telecommunications industry across Southern, Eastern and Western Africa regions.

He has experience in managing commercial teams in both fixed and mobile telecoms. He worked for Celtel Zambia as Sales and Distribution Director and thereafter worked as Sales and Distribution Director for Celtel Kenya. He went on to join Vodafone Ghana as Sales Director. Mr Jere then joined ZAMTEL as Chief Commercial Officer where he turned around the company within 8 months and grew the customer base by more than 200%.

Mr Jere also worked for Glo Ghana as Commercial Director before joining MTN Zambia as Chief Sales and Distribution Officer where he oversaw the growth of the organisation’s market share from 39% to 53%.

“I am excited to be heading up the sales and distribution function at Vodafone Zambia and I look forward to working with management and staff at all levels to continue to grow the business and add real value to the life of the digital consumer and cement the growing position of Vodafone as Zambia’s leading innovative 4G leader by delivering customer oriented digital solutions and bespoke products, creating employment, supporting young people through our graduate development programme and student ambassador programme,” said Mr Jere.

And Lars Stork, CEO of Vodafone Zambia said: “I have no doubt that our new Chief Sales and Distribution Officer will bring the capability and expertise to continue to build Vodafone Zambia as a flagship business in Zambia and maintain its position as an innovative next-generation operator.”

Wezi released the video for her latest single “Nthawi“.

The song is an audio therapy session that talks to time, reflecting of a bond that was once strong, but isn’t anymore. Broken relationships and bereavement and how things start and end with time.

The video was directed by Lawdak and Qbick of NXT solutions.

BY KAPA187

Copperbelt Minister Bowman Lusambo has announced that he used his January monthly salary to procure over 600 xK25 bags of mealie meal and over 1,000 bottles of cooking oil which he donated to the vulnerable people in Lusaka’s Munali constituency.

At a ceremony held at his Lusaka residence at which Munali Member of Parliament Professor Nkandu Luo officiated, Mr Lusambo said he was moved to share with the people of Munali because that is where he has been residing for many years.

Mr Lusambo who is also Kabushi Member of Parliament said his family decided to share with the vulnerable people in the area especially coming from a tough January month.

“I approached Ba Mama (Prof. Luo) who is the area M.P with the idea that i would like to share with the local people here, i have lived here for many many years, I had built this house and we have created a home here so my family came up with this idea because we realise that there are some amongst us who may not be as privileged,” Mr Lusambo said.

He added, “Fortunately, Ba Prof accepted our idea and we decided to go and buy these items so that we can share with you our people. Remember, we are still the same people and we are here to show you that we continue working for you.”

Mr Lusambo stated that he has on many occasions made similar donations to people in his constituency in Kabushi but decided to extend the gesture to the people of Munali where he still calls home.

He explained that the donation is purely a humanitarian gesture and has nothing to do with politics.

“If we made this donation during an election year, we would have been accused of looking for votes but there are no elections here and we are helping the people with no regard to party affiliation,” he said.

At the same function, Prof. Luo thanked Mr Lusambo for working with his office to help the poor.

She also announced that several people in Munali constituency have been helped to secure empowerment funds from various empowerment programmes.

THE opposition United Party for National Development (UPND) has asked the National Democratic Congress (NDC) to form an alliance now and together fight the ruling Patriotic Front (PF).

In an interview with the Daily Nation, UPND deputy secretary general, Patrick Mucheleka invited the NDC to join forces with UPND, in order to fight the PF as a united front.

Mr Mucheleka said that together, the opposition NDC and UPND had a higher chance of conquering the ruling party.

“Umunwe umo tausale nda (one finger cannot pick lice from one’s hair). Sometimes it requires concerted efforts of partners coming to-gether on one common agenda, fighting PF. If it means joining forces with NDC, we are ready.

“An alliance formed in the opposition can be formidable, not waiting for UPND to form government then you come. Let’s form a genuine alliance so that we stop what PF is doing,” he said.

When asked whether it was a formal invitation to other opposition political parties, Mr Mucheleka said that like minds, including NDC should come forth and form an alliance.

He said that there was nothing wrong for UPND to join forces with NDC, as long as the alliance would be based on genuine commit-ment.

Mr Mucheleka pointed out that even the ruling Patriotic Front (PF) had to form an alliance with the Movement for Multiparty Democ-racy (MMD) to form government.

He reiterated that UPND was also looking for genuine alliances with like minds in order to fight, what he termed ‘bad governance’ by the ruling party.

“UPND and NDC can come together and fight PF bad gov-ernance, we can do that without any shame,” said Mr Mucheleka.

Meanwhile, NDC spokesperson, Eric Chanda told the Daily Nation that he had to consult the bosses on the party position with regards the UPND invitation for an alliance.

By Kalima Nkonde

There has been so much debate about the merits and demerits of re-establishing the national airlines since the PF came into power in 2011.The majority of arguments supporting the national airline, have been sentimental, very superficial, uninformed and lacking support of empirical evidence given the many struggling national airlines.

Now that the Government has decided to partner with Ethiopian Airlines (ET as it is called in aviation circles), it is important that Zambians’ expectations from the deal are tone down so that they do no get disappointed as the Malawians have been, when the tangible benefits they would have expected, are not there in the foreseeable future but instead, the National airline would have built up a mountain of debt and become a strain on the national treasury due to losses like other National airlines and State Owned Enterprises.

Ethiopian airlines are currently the preferred partner by African countries. Malawi has a joint venture with ET, Ghana has shortlisted the airline for re-launch of national airlines. Nigeria started negotiations with ET to manage Arik Air but negotiations fell through due to negotiations being complicated. The Chief Executive of Ethiopian Airlines Tewolde Gebremariam said, “We decided to stop the negotiations due to financial and legal complications”.

The fallacy for the clamour to partner with ET by governments is the mistaken belief that since it is a government owned airline and it makes profit, then teaming up with Ethiopian airlines will replicate its success and make a national airline successful and profitable. This is based on lack of a deep understanding of ET’s business model.

Ethiopian airlines business Model

It is important for the reader to have some background to Ethiopian airlines and why African countries want to partner with it in re-establishing their national airlines. To begin with, the airline was founded in 1945 and started operations in 1946. According to the International Air Transportation Association (IATA), the global industry body, the state owned airline is ranked the largest airline in Africa in terms of Revenue and Profits.

What people do not know is that Ethiopian airline’s profitability does not emanate from the sales of passenger tickets only. Apart from its efficient cost cutting measures, aggressive marketing strategy, ET’s other major revenue contributors are the seven profit centres: Ethiopian Express & Ancillary Services, Ethiopian International Services, Ethiopian Cargo Services; Ethiopian MRO Services, Ethiopian Aviation Academy, ET In-flight Catering and Ethiopian Ground Services.

The airline is virtually self sufficient by having all services it needs in house while at the same providing services to other airlines to earn a lot of extra revenue and saving costs which is reflected in the bottom line. In addition, all the different Ethiopian Government administrations including the Dictatorship of Mengistu haile Mariam despite being 100% owners have never interfered in the running of the airline. The short of it is that ET’s business model is difficult to emulate by Zambia and other African Government and has been built over a period of 72 years!

Why ET is teaming up with Zambia

Zambians should be aware that the Joint Venture between Zambia and Ethiopian Airlines is not an accident or a coincidence from ET’s point of view. As far as they are concerned, it is part of their long term strategy for growth. The airline is merely implementing a 15-year Strategic Plan called Vision 2025 which it launched in 2010 after successfully completing an earlier strategic plan-Vision 2010 in which it met and exceeded all its stated goals. Under the Vision 2025, the airline anticipates increasing its fleet to 120, the number of destinations to 90, carrying more than 18 million passengers and 720,000 tonnes of cargo and with 17,000 employees. The existence of Vision 2025 was confirmed by Mr. Tewolde Gebremariam, Group CEO of Ethiopian Airlines.

“In line with our Vision 2025 multiple hubs strategy in Africa, we are very happy that the discussions with the Zambian government have been crowned with success. The launching of Zambia Airways will enable the travelling public in Zambia and the Southern African region to enjoy greater connectivity options, thereby facilitating the flow of investment, trade and tourism, and contributing to the socio-economic growth of the country and the region,” he said in a press release when acknowledging the Zambian deal.
There is no argument that Zambia Airways will be loss making for quite a long time to come and Transport and Communications Minister, Brian Mushimba did confirm that but argued that the intangible benefits will be immense. There is no doubt that Ethiopian Airlines also do know from their heart of hearts that Zambia airways will be loss making like any other national airlines at least in the first 5-10 years. The question is: what is ET’s motivation to go in a venture that will be making losses for the foreseeable future and not paying them dividends? The answer lies in the benefits that Ethiopian airlines will accrue through providing services to the airline which will increase the Holding Company’s revenue in Addis Ababa.

The experience of Malawi who entered in a similar deal in 2014 and was promised by ET that the airline will breakeven in two years but this has not happened gives credence to this belief. The Malawians are now questioning the deal as there are not seeing the benefits and arguing that only ET is benefiting.

Ethiopian airlines’ benefits from Zambia National airline

Ethiopian airlines’ benefits from the joint venture with Zambia lies in the possible services that Ethiopian Airlines will be providing Zambia Airways 2014, which in itself is not a bad thing especially if services will be discounted. In view of the benefits to the holding company, ET is unlikely to bother whether the airlines will be making profits or not as the Group as a whole will still be making profits. Below is the possible revenue generating benefits ET is likely to enjoy from the Joint venture.

First and foremost, Ethiopia airlines have been acquiring Aircraft from Boeing, Airbus and Bombardier and have excess capacity of airplanes without routes. In June 2017, Reuters reported that ET had placed an order of 10 737 Max 8 planes bringing the total on order to 30.It also signed a purchase agreement with Bombardier for five Q400 turboprop aircraft. There is no doubt that ET is likely to provide Zambia airways 2014 with either these models but more likely older models on either Wet lease (ACMI) or dry lease and thereby provide ET with millions of dollars in revenue through finance leases charges.

Secondly, Zambia Airways 2014 does not have any maintenance facilities and for the airline to get the Air Operator Certificate (AOC) from Civil Aviation Authority of Zambia (CAAZ) as required by ICAO (International Civil Aviation organisation), it will need to sign an agreement with an MRO (Maintenance Repair Organisation). ET has a world class maintenance facility which is accredited to the American Federal Aviation Administration to maintain American registered Aircraft. There is no doubt that Zambia Airways’ aircraft will be maintained at ET facility and thus earning them more revenue.

Thirdly, Zambia Airways 2014 is unlikely to have Zambians qualified as maintenance Technicians or Airline Captains on Boeing Aircraft, Airbus or Bombardier but ET has a Training school for pilots established in 1964 and an Aviation Maintenance Technician School established in 1967 which provide specialist training for both Ethiopian and foreign trainees. The new National Airline will have to send its trainees there and pay for such training and this will be additional revenue for ET.

Fourthly, ET has simulator facilities. Pilots are required to undergo refresher courses at regular intervals by passing a simulator course. It goes without saying that all pilots in the new Zambia Airways 2014 will have to undergo simulator training at ET facilities Addis Ababa generating more revenue for ET.

Fifthly, there is no shadow of doubt that the new Zambian airlines will sign a management Contract with Ethiopian airlines. Management fees will have to be paid to Ethiopian Airlines at regular intervals.

This airline project will be a net exporter of foreign exchange whether we like it or not as the above services run in millions of dollars and they will not be recovered from ticket sales or the imagined tourist arrivals.

Is Government K 400 million investment in National Airline prudent?

For the record, the Zambian government will have invested a minimum of $40 million in the Zambian Airways 2014 project by the end of 2018. This is so because Government paid airbus $10 million deposit for aircraft acquisition about two years ago and nobody seems to talk about. This is a well known fact by all in Zambia aviation circles. This means the $10 million already paid to Airbus and the projected $30 million from the 2018 budget will bring the total investment to $40 million or K400 million by end of 2018. The question is: Is this the most prudent way of using scarce tax payer’s money? What is the real motivation of people behind this project? It does not make economic sense to start a non- income generating luxury project at this stage when the country has billions in debt to service, struggling to pay farmers for maize and inputs, has cholera due water and sanitation issues, Universities closed due to unpaid allowances to students, delayed civil servants salaries due to huge wage bill and the list goes on and on!

It is clear from the analysis that the bulk of $30million dollar invested by Government in the first year will find its way to Addis Ababa through services provided and there will be nothing much to show for it in terms of tangible benefits to the majority of Zambians in Chibolya, chimwemwe, Mpatamatu, Kanyama, John Lengi, Mongu, Mansa, Chamboli,Maramba,Mpika, Solwezi, Monze, Petauke, Mwinilunga etc.

And going forward, since the government is the majority shareholder and given that the airline will be making losses in the foreseeable future, the Government will either pump in more tax payer money to keep it afloat or provide sovereign guarantee for Zambia airways 2014 loans like the governments in Botswana, South Africa, Namibia, Zimbabwe and others do for their national airlines which they are stuck with and want to get rid of. There is no shadow of doubt that the new airline will start building a mountain of debt within the first two years of operations.

Conclusion

There is no argument about the need for Zambia to promote the Aviation sector but the national airline Full Cost Carrier (FCC) business model is the wrong way to go about as it amounts to doing almost the same thing as before and expecting a different result. The proper solution and business model would have been found if private sector aviation experts were fully involved rather than ZAF, Party cadres, Civil servants and Politicians with little knowledge about the complexity of the aviation industry who drove the process to start national airline.

The major impediments to the growth of the sector are the cost of doing business in the sector in comparison with neighbouring countries. The local and foreign airlines that have closed shop in Zambia have mainly done so on account of the cost of operating an airline in Zambia.

The cost of aviation fuel in Zambia is the highest in the region and fuel in one of the major components of operating an airline and it can make or break a carrier. The other major cost of a carrier in Zambia is government levies and taxes which are way too high. The cost of a domestic airline ticket is made of 25% taxes and levies. There are four types of taxes that passengers pay to fly domestically – departure tax, civil aviation tax, security tax and development tax and yet well run Airlines’ net profit margin world wide is about 5%. If one was to ads 35% income tax, it means government takes 60% of an airline’s cashflow. This is no way to develop the industry.