EX-FREEDOM FIGHTERS’ WELFARE
EVERY independence anniversary and African Freedom Day commemoration, voices have resonated on the imperative need to look into the welfare of former freedom fighters.
Various commentators and former freedom fighters themselves have poured out touching stories of the woes they have been facing after having sacrificed so much to liberate this country from the colonial shackles.
Some of them have complained that they have remained forgotten heroes and only remembered during independence anniversary when they are invited for the routine processions.
During independence anniversary, the media gets hyped about the former freedom fighters, interviewing them to generate the narrative about the liberation struggle.
Thereafter, the heroes recoil to their homesteads and get forgotten until another commemoration.
Yes, Zambia’s independence in 1964 was a result of collective efforts of the freedom fighters, who sacrificed to ensure the success of the liberation of the country from the British colonialists.
The men and women shed blood while others died at the hands of the colonial masters who resisted giving up power until more tactics and pressure were exerted to the hilt.
Thus the freedom fighters made a great deal of impact on the entire liberation struggle under Harry Mwaanga Nkumbula’s African National Congress and Kenneth Kaunda’s United National Independence Party.
Certainly, apart from the medals bestowed on them, the country should find a way of looking after the heroes in practical terms.
Of course, some of them are fairly comfortable while others are swallowing in poverty in advanced age; they are living in squalor.
Therefore, Government, the private sector and many other organisations should come together and mobilise resources, which could be deposited into a trust or invested in a cooperative or any other sustainable model.
For instance, with sufficient resources, stakeholders can come up with resource centres comprising political libraries and museums, tracing Zambia’s history from the ancient era through British South African Company (BSA) and British colonial administration.
Such repositories should also have post-independence era of coalition Government, multi-party, single party from 1973 to 1991 when multiparty set up was re-introduced up to date.
Such resource centres could be run on Public Private Partnership with representatives of the former freedom fighters making much of the Board of Trustees.
Such a project can be carried out by all stakeholders including political players from both sides of the divide.
There are many other models which can be adopted to raise and grow resources for the heroes whose efforts resulted in the birth of Zambia we live in today.
Heaping such a task on Government, as suggested by some quarters, may not work at the moment, considering the contorted fiscal space.
It is time Zambians came together to initiate a viable and long-term project instead of just narrating stories of how some independence heroes are suffering.
The British had demonstrated the importance of recognising heroes when in 1964 the Queen bequeathed BCEL, MOTH, RAOB, Anzac Arms and other properties to the ex-service community, which consisted of black Zambians who fought along the British allies in the First and Second World Wars.
The properties, which are still standing today, were given to the world war veterans and post-independence ex-servicemen in Zambia along the line of rail.
Therefore, a model needs to be worked out quickly for the purposes of looking after the welfare of the former freedom fighters.
Former freedom fighters are a repository of the entire narrative of the emergence of black political consciousness, which birthed the liberation struggle.