By Edward Chisanga
It’s easier for former President Edgar Lungu to point to bridges, roads, clinics, hospitals and other so-called infrastructure sites and argue, “This’s my positive legacy. I deserve to be reelected as President.” And citizens see that visibly.
But the former President has not done the same with the economy, measured by Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth, on the one hand, and GDP per capita growth, on the other, and therefore, citizens are not aware of this part of his legacy. According to those who benefitted most from his appeasing hand of free cash, bicycles, blankets, wheelbarrows, subsidized mealie meal, fuel and other handouts, he was a good man who must come back because, it’s easy for him to “Sonta apoabombele,” meaning he can point at his frivolous achievements. But they too ignore to show the citizens his role in the overall economy.
Mr. Lungu leaves a legacy of decayed economy, that’s why, in countries where citizens are serious, he should be held accountable. But he’s so lucky that almost no citizen, except a few has strongly echoed the message of accountability. The debate in this country so far has been that the Hichilema government should focus on fixing the broken economy and not talk about its brokenness. But it’s only practicing good governance when we ask to know first the extent of the brokenness before expecting his successor to chat a future path of fixing it. It’s really naïve to argue that we should fix the economy without first holding accountable the one who broke it. Does it mean that if the current government were to leave a broken economy, we should simply ask the successor to move on and fix it?
According to me, this economy is so deeply broken that I cannot expect this government, or the one after, even thereafter to fix it and begin to benefit citizens fairly. It’ll take at least fifty years to fix it before seeds of real benefits can begin to germinate. What the current government can do in short and medium terms is to fix economic basics, such as facilitating households to have three decent meals a day, clean water, affordable transport, health and education, of which my priority is three good meals a day. Three decent meals a day disappeared several years ago and has only become worse.
Long-term fixing of the economy means we have reliable, predictable, affordable and productive energy, or achieving Vision 2030’s projections on energy. This itself is likely to trigger other factors of development. But, we’re still very far from this state of energy. I also feel that this government should invest in early child development to prepare critical and productive human capital with cognitive function that can transform this country in future, even if good proceeds of that investment will not be enjoyed by the Sower of the good seed but future generations, who’ll appreciate. At the moment, that human capita is mythical.
These two, plus of course other factors such as productive infrastructure, technology and a developmental state put together, are likely to lead to structural transformation. Not today under mythical factors. Today, the concept of ‘transformation’ is highly misused. Even where factors do not exist, we hear leaders in a chorus of economic transformation. It’s not so easy. Transformation is what takes place in Viet Nam, which has overtaken the whole African continent of fifty-five nations in global exports of manufactured goods.
Economic growths under past leaderships
Levy Mwanawasa
Figure 1 below shows a graph depicting economic growth, measured by GDP under MMD President Levy Mwanawasa. It shows a good trend of growth for almost four years and above average of about 7% per annum, which is very good, with a decline starting a year before his end.
Rupiah Banda
Under Rupiah Banda who succeeded Mwanawasa, Figure 2 shows three good years of economic success, growing from 8% in 2008 to 10% in 2010 before recording one episode of a contraction down to less than 6%. Again, 8% us a robust number.
Michael Sata
It’s the long period of PF failure that must catch the eye of citizens. It can be seen that from 2012 – 2014 before Mr. Sata’s end in 2014, growth trends reached continuous contractions, in particular from about 7.5% in 2012 to about 4.8% as shown in Figure 3 below. If only Sata’s growth of 7% had continued, we can speculate that good things would have come. But, it did not.
Edgar Lungu
Then came the long period of Mr. Lungu’s rule, characterized by continuous deep economic contraction from 2015-2020, a period of about six years shown in Figure 4 below. You’ll note. that in 2020, economic growth contracted by an episode of almost minus 3%. This is explained more clearly in the 8th NDP, 2022-2026 that states, “Another notable development was in 2020 when economic growth contracted by 2.8 percent, registering the first recession since 1998.” So, citizens must hold Lungu’s leadership accountable for driving them into a recession, from which, I’m not sure if recovery has since been made, given the growing economic hardship. To say the least, this was the most horrible time for the economy in the history of Zambia. We’ll hear an excuse that Covid19 was responsible. But we know that economic collapse was registered long before Covid 19 which came only in 2019.
I have also made an assessment of GDP per capita growth and found that growth contracted sharply and significantly, even by an episode of about minus 6% in the same year shown in Figure 5 below. This contraction in GDP per capita which is not easy to point a figure at, obviously has immense impact on citizens’ purchasing power that has culminated into increased poverty today. That’s why a recession occurred.
Concluding
Earlier on, I made a position that it’ll take long to shake off this economic downturn of almost a decade created by PF rule. Let it be remembered that whatever growth takes place now and in future is meant to fill the PF economic gaps of its past rule. It’s only after that is done, that future governments will then begin to grow the economy. For now, we cannot claim that we’re growing the economy when it’s all about filling past huge gaps shown in Figures 4 and 5 respectively.
In 2017, Mr. Lungu made a public statement, “We’re going to leave a legacy that will make the generations to come proud.” On the economy, Mr. Lungu must admit that he leaves a legacy of decayed economy.
