Salt saana: Students signal Zambia’s decay
By Osward Bwali
THEY say fish begins to decay from the head. If the rot has reached the tail of the fish, the head is rotten to the core. It must be thrown away. You can add salt saana but diarrhoea will be guaranteed if you eat the fish.
Hakainde Hichilema is the head that is rotten to the point where one consumes it only out of utter desperation or ignorance.
Many people have tabulated the evil deeds of Hichilema. The evils come from his darkened and hardened soul like Nebuchadnezzar’s. It’s not hatred as Hichilema and many of his followers, especially tribesmen and women love so much to hide behind.
It’s the incompetence, the cruelty, the greed, the brutality, the hypocrisy, the cultism, and as some say, the occultism, the vengefulness, and the tribalism. There is little doubt the man is diabolical to the point of no return.
Hichilema has subverted government institutions making them all party to his dirty schemes he calls mingalato. As if the decay of the judiciary, parliament, Registrar of Societies were not enough, he has gone on to tarnish the Seventh Day Adventist (SDA) church and now seeks to do the same to the Catholic Church through material inducement, character assassination, and divide and rule.
Hichilema has had great success with students in colleges and universities. The recruitment probably starts at the point of student elections where there have been rumours of heavy State House involvement in funding selected factions. The levels of campaigns in recent elections at Zambia’s public universities and colleges appear to support this suspicion as the resources poured into them are beyond what an average home is able or willing to invest.
Students have been recruited into the UPND rank and file. During the controversial Bill 7 that has since become law, students from across public institutions abandoned learning, found resources to make campaign materials and marched in support of the bill. The students parroted choreographed messages that exhibited a naïve understanding of the real intentions and pitfalls of the bill.
Critical observers noted the very few good aspects of the bill but highlighted these were merely sugarcoating sinister intentions that included delimitation that would allow Hichilema to balloon numbers of MPs in his tribal strongholds. These numbers would give Hichilema a legislative blank cheque allowing him to change the Constitution to create a virtual one-party state.
This would effectively kill democracy as we have enjoyed it for the last 35 years. Although this argument was plain to see, student leaders of public universities through the National Council of Student Unions merely parroted youth inclusion, probably seeing themselves as among the first beneficiaries.
Recently, we have seen again Hichilema abusing students by bussing them in large numbers on the Copperbelt to endorse his candidature for the elections in August. The shamelessness of the whole skit is unthinkable.
An endorsement should be done with one’s free will and not through inducement. The pattern is clear. Student elections, bill 7 and the endorsement all look well-funded and rehearsed. They all have the UPND and State House fingerprints on them.
What goes behind the scenes exactly, only Hichilema’s team and the student leadership will know. What one might reasonably guess is financial inducement. State House releases colossal sums of money for student elections and for student solidarity marches.
Of course, only a fraction reaches the student leaders as the State House operatives skim off the top soup. The student leaders most likely do not use every coin on T-shirts, placards and logistics. The larger chunk pays their ‘allowances’. Then the drummers, dancers, and singers receive their K100 or K50.
The abuse of students by Hichilema is disgusting, but reveals him once more as a desperate narcissistic cynic who will go as low as possible to secure his interests. A whole Head of State using students in this manner is abominable.
Because of the harsh economic situation, students will abandon lessons or seminars to be paraded by the president. Whereas the student leaders are walking away happily with enough to support their parents and siblings, most of the students are taking the risk for nothing.
The risk by the student leaders is great, though. They could potentially be exchanging a flourishing career for a few brown envelops. There is a very good chance that the UPND will lose the elections this year. Student leaders could be blacklisted. Add to this the public resentment towards people known as mushanina bwali or sebana wikute. If they are walking in shame today, tomorrow the public and career consequences will be felt more strongly.
In the event of political violence that cannot be ruled out, student leaders are likely to be targeted by those who have seen them as sellouts. For example, in the past, student leaders who were discovered to be sellouts had their rooms touched.
Unfortunately, the hardships parents are going through will make them welcome the bribe money rather than advise their children to refrain from the shady and dangerous extracurricular activities.
For the students being paid K100, is that how cheaply you can sell yourselves for? You are risking failing your course, poor grades, being injured or dying in a road mishap or political violence for a shawarma? Your parents are sacrificing everything for you to learn, behind their back, you are risking all their sacrifices for a K100.
This is not to say students cannot be involved in national politics. It is their right and students have always played an important role in Zambian politics. In the past, students were feared by governments. They stood for truth and justice. They spoke truth to power. They were the salt of the country. Alas, today, students stand for opportunism, for a brown envelop, for a K100. Yesterday students shaped foreign policy, they were the first line of defence against democratic erosion.
If Michelo Chizombe, Tracy Jabalani, Kabaso Mwanto, Jemimah Mwaba were student leaders during 2000, Frederick Chiluba’s Third Term would have passed as law. Students then were critical in stopping Chiluba’s bid to change the Constitution for his personal wish to stay on as president.
If Harry Mwaanga Nkumbula, Kenneth Kaunda, Julia Mulenga Chikamoneka, and Simon Kapwepwe behaved like today’s student leaders, Zambia would not have been freed from colonial rule in 1964.
With the recent and current crop of student leaders, Zambia has reached the last stage of moral and political decay that started at the top with Hichilema. Elsewhere in Africa and beyond, Gen Z are the bastion of democracy.
Standing on principle to protest dictatorship and harsh economic conditions. Zambian students cannot even protest for their own clean, safe, and secure campuses. Instead, student leaders line up in the political red lights waiting for the next client to hire them for a march. Cry my beloved country!
I am writing not as a resigned pessimist. I am writing to expose the decadence we have reached as a country. I am writing to the youths who share my sorrow to resist political manipulation to auction their future for old politician’ small change.
If more young people stand on principle, truth, and justice, there’s a big chance for Zambia; then our chances for national healing, renewal, and revival will be higher. Instead of thinking about yourself, think about the country. Instead of thinking about now, thinking about tomorrow.
Let’s build a legacy for posterity. Instead of adding salt to a rotten fish, let’s go to Zambezi, Luangwa, Kafue, Chambeshi, Bangweulu, Kafue, Kariba, and Tanganyika and catch ourselves a fresh fish. Let’s not fall for empty slogans. Let’s start anew!
