Political appointments will derail corruption fight, warns Dodia
PRESIDENT Hakainde Hichilema’s fight against corruption is likely to fail because he has gone against his word of separating professionalism from politics in his appointments, economist Yusuf Dodia has said.
Mr. Dodia said President Hichilema assured the nation that he would separate the two to ensure that politicians remain in the political arena and appoint professional people.
He said in an interview that developing a professional civil service was a major challenge that the President faced because if he fails to achieve that then the country is going to see the usual traits of corruption, mismanagement, and misappropriation of funds beginning to surface.
“The President must ensure that those given the responsibility of bringing development to the people are professionals and not politicians. He should critically look at this matter, if not we are likely to see money being stolen, being misappropriated and again that challenge of corruption becomes very real,” he said.
Mr. Dodia said the country has in the past 20 years seen the professionalism of the government deteriorating steadily with each successive government because of politicians being appointed as permanent secretaries, directors, and district commissioners. He said the trend has never been in the best interest of the nation because those are public positions that should not be politicised as those appointed have a huge responsibility of delivering service to the public and not politicking.
Meanwhile, Mr. Dodia said as a developing economy, Zambia shouldn’t be following the Western blueprint of looking at 100 days in office for any President because the economies in Africa face more challenges than those in America and Europe.
He feels that any President coming into office would need one year in which to score some positive development because 100 days are not enough for an African President to deliver.
“Our economies are much more difficult than American and European economies and I would imagine that any President coming into office would need one year in which to register some positive development in that respect,” Mr Dodia said.