Chiefs refute dishing out huge chunks of land

...it is unfortunate that foreigners speak well about Zambia than Zambians themselves

FORMER House of Chiefs chairperson, Chief Kaputa has dispelled assertions that traditional leaders sold huge chunks of land to foreigners without government involvement.

Chief Kaputa said contrary to assertions by some sections of society that traditional leaders are fond of selling large pieces of land to foreign investors, no traditional leader has done that.

There has been complaints from Masaiti and Mwinilunga that traditional leaders have made it a habit to sell huge pieces of land to foreign investors at the expense of their subjects who end up being displaced.

The traditional leader said huge land investment requires government involvement.

He explained that chiefs' mandate in terms of land allocation is limited to 250 hectares while the Ministry of Lands can allocate up to 1, 000 hectares.

The chief wondered why some traditional leaders can be accused of selling huge pieces of land to foreign investors when their capacity to do so is limited to not more than 250 hectares.

"Honestly, I do not know of any chief who has given large chunks of land to any foreigner. I say so because large land investment requires government participation," Chief Kaputa said.

The traditional leader added that government agencies are always involved when it comes to land allocation to foreign investors on projects of national interest.

Chief Kaputa said supporting institutions such as local authorities were also consulted whenever the traditional leaders were dealing with matters of land. - ZANIS.

“Honestly, I do not know of any chief who has given large chunks of land to any foreigner. I say so because large land investment requires government participation,” Chief Kaputa said.

IDear editor, n one of my articles a fortnight ago, I talked about the need to rebrand our country and I stated the fact that rebranding our country can only be done by Zambians themselves because we know the country better than anyone else.

The outside world will believe what we will tell them about our country, whether negative or positive. If we say Zambians are bad people, that is what outsiders will believe and vice-versa. We have a choice to create a kind of image for our country to non-Zambians.

Most nations elsewhere have been developed mostly by their own citizens and we can do that for Zambia if we want to just like we can destroy what we have if we choose to. But where are we going to go if we took that course?

Back to the gist of my writeup today, as we continue counting down to the August 12, 2021 General Elections, it is obvious that politicians and in particular those in the opposition are likely to come up with all kinds of campaign messages in a bid to lure the electorates into voting for them, their candidate or indeed their party.

My concern is the kind of messages these leaders are preaching about affairs of a country they want to rule and much of them are negative messages. I know that is the language of politicians but at the same time, I am concerned as a Zambian because most of these messages are actually painting this country black and that does not help us at all.

As we criticize the current regime in our campaigns, let us be mindful of what we say because it can be used against us in future.

We have politicians who are just full of negative energy and to them, there is nothing good worth speaking about Zambia today and to them, “things in the country are bad” in Zambia and they are ones who can do it right once voted into office.

But the most interesting thing however, which we should all scrutinize is that if things are really that bad in Zambia, why have we continued to have an influx of foreigners coming into the country? You do not need to check with our Department of Immigrations because we do live with these people in our communities.

We have a number of foreign nationals staying with us and some of us eat with them, chat with them and we become one big family.

If you go in any compound or area in Lusaka, most of the people running different kinds of businesses are foreigners and they have become successful business persons.

To my surprise, non-nationals in this country have appreciated the warm reception that we have accorded them and they have thrived in business because of the conducive trading environment that the Zambian Government has created.

Is that not something we should spread to the outside world that Zambia is one of the best countries to do business in this part of Africa? And by so doing, don’t you think we will be attracting potential investors into the country?

Some of us who interact with these brothers and sisters in the community, they have nothing bad to say about Zambia and at times I wonder why Zambians are the ones in the forefront of talking ill about their own country.

Are foreigners more Zambian than the Zambians themselves because they are the ones portraying a positive image about the country while its own nationals, born and bred in the country are busy spreading bad messages in the media and other platforms.

Yes, not everything is good and neither is it bad that but can be objective in our criticism and campaigns and let us strive to say something good about our own country and we lose nothing by doing that, do we?

Let us reflect and carry out an introspection as Zambians.

Stay blest!

FRANCIS CHIPALO, The author Francis Chipalo is a Lusaka- based Journalist and a Freelance Public Relations Practitioner.

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