It is a very long time since an opposition party in Southern Africa managed to remove a seating political party from power. Infact for some countries like Botswana it remains a pipe dream. That story continued last week when Frelimo crushed Renamo in Mozambique elections. A result the legendary Alfonso... [view entry]

“The nation did not get a good deal from the Taskforce. A lot of money was spent on private lawyers. The facts on the expenditure and recoveries speak for themselves,” Home Affairs Minister Lameck Mangani correctly identifying the fundamental problem with the Task Force. This essentially borrows the argument, I... [view entry]

A key challenge of tackling public theft in Zambia is simply understanding its scale. The general public certainly has a sense of where public money has been stolen, but it appears they are missing key information on the extent of corruption. In practice there remains significant vacuum of information on... [view entry]

There are many good reasons for not having the freedom of information bill at the moment, but this is not one of them :Vice president George Kunda says the freedom of information bill has been withdrawn from parliament. Kunda said in parliament that the bill can not be made into... [view entry]

A wonderful UK registered charity that is making it possible for Zambian orphans and other impoverished children to go to school. Cecily's Fund works closely with Zambian partner organisations, Hodi, CHEP andBwafwano to:Enable more than 9,500 children who have been orphaned or made vulnerable because of AIDS to go to... [view entry]

I found myself reading the Dora Siliya Tribunal Findings and this wonderful assessment by Transparency International. It is remarkable that Zambians tolerate the fact that a Minister can be found in breach of so many things and be reinstated because she did not apparently "breach the constitution". Don't complain, we... [view entry]

Government and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) have signed a financial agreement aimed at "strengthening the electoral process". The agreement, estimated at K68billion (US$15m), will run for a period of four years and will be co-financed by the USA, Canada, Finland and EU. The money is supposedly intended to... [view entry]

ZDDM will not let the Task Force go quietly. Earlier this week they repeated earlier charges that the now disbanded Task Force on Corruption was compromised and should be investigated :Investigate and prosecute disbanded Task Force on corruption officials - ZDDM (Source: ZANIS, 3 Nov 2009)The Zambia Direct Democracy Movement... [view entry]

A surprising, but welcome forecast for end year economic growth from the CSO. Particularly surprising because it substantially deviates from by atleast two percentage points from the Budget forecast:Economy expected to grow by 6.3%, CSO Bulletin, October 2009 :Preliminary estimates of real Gross Domestic Product (GDP) show that the Zambian... [view entry]

A guest blog on the role of chiefs in politics over at the House of Chiefs by Henry Kyambalesa. I think HK correctly identifies the problem : "I believe very strongly that the partisan stance by some of our chiefs is partly promoted by the subsidies, electrification of palaces and... [view entry]