DEAL WITH SOCIAL MEDIA ILLS

THE opposition has invested very heavily in media: social, radio, television and print in order to champion a cause of disinformation and hopefully use it to push for regime change and the results are now showing. Kitwe was rocked by riots yesterday sparked by false reports that Government has sold the State-owned ZAFFICO to a Chinese company. It was social media at play by inciting a gullible section of Zambians into believing that it was true. We feel it is time that Government realised the power of social media and not undermine its influence which could lead to turmoil in the nation. It should not be too casual about its threat. That is exactly what its sponsors want to see, making the country ungovernable and the people losing faith in the government. Government must be alive to the fact that the opposition has invested heavily in social, electronic, print and online media which they are using to try and cause chaos. A number of unfortunate incidents have taken place in the country during the past few months which have been exaggerated by social media through misinformation that could have been nipped in the bud. The furore involving the TAZARA memorial park in Chongwe’s Silverest area is a case in point. The other being the confusion surrounding the purported sale of the state-owned ZAFFICO to a Chinese company – which again is not true. Having a company listed on the stock exchange does not mean it’s up for sale! For days, social media have been awash with stories that the Chinese are about to establish their own cemetery in Chongwe – without the local leadership being aware. As a result Chongwe district council ordered the Chinese contractor to stop work. It took the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr Joe Malanji to make an impromptu visit to the site to explain what the project was all about. Mr Malanji explained that it was a government to government project. He said the memorial park is supposed to house the remains of the 36 Chinese nationals who died during the construction of the TAZARA. Mr Malanji toured the site with Lusaka Province Minister Bowman Lusambo and Chinese ambassador to Zambia Li Jie. He said Government was aware of the project and supported it. But did it have to take the whole Foreign Affairs Minister to explain in person what was happening in Chongwe? Government should have pre-empted the misinformation and the bad publicity that came with it if from the beginning it had identified the potential danger and given the correct information. Zambians have nothing against the Chinese even though the country’s detractors - local and foreign - have waged an all-out propaganda war that China is up to no good. Social media succeeded in making the people believe that the Chinese were establishing their own cemetery in Chongwe. And of course, their reaction was genuine, why in Chongwe of all places? We all know the apprehension that China’s economic relations with the Third World, particularly Africa has caused in Western capitals – that the Chinese are out to “colonise” Africa by leading the continent into a debt trap. It is a theme that is being touted by their surrogates locally, these being opposition parties and some civil society organisations. What has made things worse though is that now they are openly attacking the Chinese, whipping up xenophobic hysteria. As President Edgar Lungu said yesterday in Kitwe, it was the responsibility of the police to curb criminality and malice which resulted in xenophobic behaviour, targeting a particular nationality. He, therefore, urged the security wings in the country to be proactive to stop such malicious acts. Our view is that even the public relations wings in government ministries must be proactive by keeping the public informed about what is going on in their ministries. They do not have to wait for the Minister of Information and Broadcasting Services, who happens to be the chief government spokesperson to “douse’ the flames. President Lungu, according to his special assistant for press and public relations Amos Chanda, said he is very disappointed with criminal elements inciting xenophobic attacks on the Chinese over misleading reports that ZAFFICO had been sold. Government must stop being passive and reacting only when damage has been done. It must also wage an aggressive publicity drive to push its agenda by keeping