ARREST LOOTERS, TRADITIONAL CHIEF TELLS PRESIDENT
By ANNIE ZULU in Mafinga SENIOR Chief Mwenechifungwe of the Namwanga people of Mafinga district has asked President Edgar Lungu to arrest people stealing public resources.
Chief Mwenechifungwe said Government was working hard to better people’s lives but a clique of certain individuals was defrauding and stealing public resources with impunity.
The Chief was speaking yesterday when President Edgar Lungu and his entourage paid a courtesy call on him.
“Your Excellency the e-voucher system has been compromised. People in cooperatives have not benefited at all. Imagine in some cases out of 40 people, only three people benefited because the people implementing the e-voucher system were using underhand methods,” Chief Mwenechifungwe.
He explained that Government officials implementing the e-voucher were leaving out genuine farmers who belonged to cooperatives.
“Your Excellency arrest these people who are stealing public resources. Let them be examples that it is not right to steal from poor people,” Chief Mwenechifungwe said.
He said Mafinga solely depends on agriculture as the driver of the economy.
The chief also explained to the President that Mafinga district was being used to fraudulently employ teachers.
“There were 108 ghost teachers here. People from Lusaka, Kasama, Chinsali and other places get employed but they leave in the night. Our schools are now deserted. There are no teachers. We want our own people here to get these jobs because they will not abandon us. 101 teachers were transferred from April to June,” Chief Mwenechifungwe said.
He also complained to the President about the bad state of the road connecting Mafinga district to Isoka.
“Your Excellency, I wish you could have come by road so you see for your self how bad it is. The other day I slept in the hills because the road is very bad,” chief Mwenechifungwe said.
And Chief Mwenechifungwe said the Patriotic Front (PF) has given Zambians hope for a better country.
Chief Mwenechifungwe said it was under the PF that the country had experienced massive infrastructure projects.
He however said a number of projects in Mafinga had stalled and so there was need to complete them.
In response to the chief’s concerns, President Lungu agreed with the traditional leader that the e-voucher has had challenges.
“The e-voucher is a new system hence facing some teething problems. The system is meant to protect genuine farmer and we are clearing it so that next year it works better,” President Lungu said.