Local Government and Urban Development Minister Gary Nkombo has said the removal of mobile money booths from the Central Business District of Lusaka has been done to bring sanity in the city.
Mr. Nkombo says the mobile money booths were located in areas where the Lusaka City Council had not designated them to be located.
Speaking this afternoon after he flagged off a three day cleaning exercise of the Central Business District of Lusaka, Mr Nkombo said the removal of the booths was done in the spirit of orderliness.
He said the association for mobile money operators was in agreement with the relocation.
Meanwhile, Lusaka Mayor Chilando Chitangala has bemoaned the vandalism of refuse bins in the city.
Ms Chitangala said some unscrupulous people are stealing metals from the bins and selling them as scrap metals.
Stanbic Bank Zambia Chief Executive Officer Mwindwa Siakalima said the bank wants to join efforts in cleaning up the city.
Lusaka Central Business District (CBD) has witnessed the mushrooming of mobile booths which has turned the city to be filthy at the expense of making money and cleanliness of the town.
A Lusaka resident George Banda has urged the Council to consider removing the vendors from the CBD if they are serious about maintaining a clean city.
Mr Banda said vendors are the major contributors of the waste generated in town and its a pity that the situation has continued without being addressed.
CBD must be cleaned every two months and then spread to the entire city…everyone must clean up we want a clean city not a smelling one..kudos Hon. GN
Why do we have councils when the jobs are done by the minister? Please, give power to municipalities or get rid of them.
mathew – You clean a CBD everyday …you clean a residential area every week
Hon.Nkombo must be supported by all well meaning citizens…. we can not allow our capital city to degenerate into such a filthy state…how do we attract tourists and investors to a chaotic city???? how do you guarantee the safety and security of residents in such chaos ???
So Miles Sampa right to speculate that some bank might have sponsored the booth destruction exercise. It’s important that those in leadership engage adequately with the people they lead, especially those adversely affected by their decisions. Also endeavor to mitigate the effects of your decisions. If people perceive that their government is punishing them for whatever reason then it’s the beginning of anarchy. The timing for this exercise is wrong just like the summoning of Esther Nyawa Tembo few days before the AU summit. What has more potential to tarnish the UPND image in the eyes of foreign Heads of State is the case of Esther Nyawa Tembo and not the booths
Whilst the whole country needs to be clean, there are two issues I take concern over.
1. Why do this now when we are about to host the AU meeting? Are we embarrassed of our own people? It’s apparently been dirty this whole time. What are we trying to show to them? Certainly, all of these countries have intelligence in Zambia and they know about what is going on currently.
2. Gary Nkombo seems to be disgusted by people poorer than him. He earlier made statements that I found offensive when he first kicked street vendors from Lusaka (congratulations by the way, they are back there). His second episode was the infamous act of forcing people to drink alcohol, then demanding that they come to his office, where instead of apologising he seemingly threatened them to apologize for their wrong…
Actions, he never said sorry to them but only that what they were doing was wrong, he could have done both, he went on to justify his actions.
And now he is seemingly labelling the mobile booth operators as dirty people who are making the city unclean. Anyone here should know that traders in these areas clean their surroundings, even our women selling vegetables in Soweto clean their areas.
What we need, better garbage collection and a collective mindset change.
People in good cars throw their trash outside of their windows like it’s normal.
In Singapore you get a jail term for throwing trash on the street
When they wanted your votes they never told you that they would destroy your sources of income. Now that they have used your votes they call your sources of income dirty. Meanwhile they are eating cdf funds and enriching themselves. They even can afford million kwacha weddings for their daughters on boats. Just last year this boy garry was destitute in mazambuka and a mere teacher. We warned you
You cannot just remove the booths leaving the vendors. Sanity must be brought back to the capital city once known as the garden city.
He He He!
Sanity neefs to be brought back to a cabinet containing the likes of Nkombo
@Chiza Chirwa,
Mwana, I find your comments today to be off………is it really you Chiza Chirwa, I know on LT?
From your comment of connecting @Tarino====> @Spaka=====> to @Kaiza and now your comment #3, make me wonder, are you in the right frame today, boyi!
Careful this chap will connect you to me…really laughble…it like a puppy that has discovered it has a tail and wants to bite it hence keeps running in circles.
I don’t hide my ID, and I don’t use a VPN, I have nothing to hide and I use my real name too.
I reiterate without apology, cleaning up should have been done earlier. It’s pretentious to do it now.
Secondly, Gary appears to hate poor people, he uttered offensive words when kicking street vendors, he forced poor people to drink alcohol, and now he says they are dirty.
And about Toni, that’s the same person posting here under the names Kaizar Zulu, Spaka. And he was formerly using the name Akaps, a backwards spelling of Spaka before he switched to Kaizar Zulu and he begun using that name as a joke but surprisingly has clung to it.
Observer his style of writing, same thing.
Chiza; kaizer can’t be Spaka. Spaka is a Tonga. Kaizer is a bit cleverer and should I say more street wise than Spaka. Tarino who used to post under Jay Jay and disappeared with Mushota is more sane snd educated than the suspects you are connecting him to. Spska Kaizer mutaware Ackson Sejane and Kambwili should be locked up in the same cell one day so that Rwanda can happen. These will spark a tribal war in Zambia
Tarino wants to be me not the other way round. Fuseke
Yes the CBD must be kept clean. I feel sorry for that young female vendor who had vowed to commit suicide if Lungu was going to win the last election.
Garden city my foot. Just visit Garden compound and Yaba! Ba Nkombo go to Kigali and see the transformation there. Ask Kagame to pass you his formula then come and implement it. But UPND is full of inferiority complexes so they can only implement what an Italian or Briton or American commands.
Its laughable that this Mayor is crying about vandalism of metal refuse bins …this is a world wide problem even in UK I remember one city 10 years ago where thieves uprooted all cast iron drainage street lid in one night. The councils response was to replace them with PVC covers ….its called innovation – even 30 years ago when bins were donated to Lusaka city council they were vandalised…it seems we never learn.
People today are even stealing wire fence pipes. You wake up in the morning to find your gate and fence pipes have been removed. That is the situation today
Metal bins in this day and age! The developed world uses plastic. It lasts longer as it doesn’t rust and is easier to handle
Chiza; kaizer can’t be Spaka. Spaka is a Tonga. Kaizer is a bit cleverer and should I say more street wise than Spaka. Tarino who used to post under Jay Jay and disappeared with Mushota is more sane snd educated than the suspects you are connecting him to. Spska Kaizer mutaware Ackson Sejane and Kambwili should be locked up in the same cell one day so that Rwanda can happen. These will spark a tribal war in Zambia
Chiza you have lost it mate. Don’t get personal with Gary, deal with the issues not person. Truth be told the city is filthy. For me it doesn’t matter about the timing. This cleaning up had to be done. Reality is that the poor will always be among us. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t have order. Rwanda as the western world has poor people among them but there is still order & cleanness. Is that too much to ask for Zambia?
This Chiza Chirwa blogger lost it a long time ago and it gets worse everytime he comes here he doesnt know his ar$e to his elbow, the chap is see shadows online…its no wonder the UK based Troll is excited as he has noticed a gullible customer out of a million.
Sir, I am not being personal. To have an opinion about what type of person Gary is does not mean my view of him as a person is personal, I do think he doesn’t seem to like people who are less fortunate.
I am not insulting him.
The cleaning up had to be done, and I am listening to hot FM, he just admitted AU had influence.
And about Tarino, I will leave it at that, not worth my time.
But why is lusaka being run by a minister and not its local governance? It’s another Lusambo situation. Our presidents create monsters who have no job restrictions and descriptions thus no regard for people because they obey only the appointer
Every one wants to be me but there can only be one me. Thanks to Beatrice and my IT crew I can fully utilise vpn and prevent cyber attacks. Chi tarino I might even be using your ip address yet here I am in zambia with your f00Iish mother
If you think your IT Crew KIKIKI advising you about VPN being absolutely safe
They not fit for the job as there are more safe options out there SO WHO IS THE F00L now
But what about other street vendors of tomatoes, meat, kspenta, oranges etc
Yeah why target only the booths?
Cleaning the city yes but were you are taking the booth behind the post office car park and findeco house car park sure were is the sense coz our CBD has a problem of parking places, more over behind the post office when it rains that part of the post office it floods just as the findeco car park elo they way the booth are put they look dirty than they were on street corners.
Yeah Ras niye chimbwi no plan iyi. When you do such a thing have an alternative plan.
Also deal with those vendors who have created a third lane and are competing for space with motorists on Cairo road.
Gary, lets start with Mazabuka first, as u r entering from monze there is alot of dirty just next to the rail line. you have been in power now for a while and i was hoping you would have cleaned up your district by now……..Next LSK. .. the most dirty capital city ive been so far needs to be sorted starting from Soweto martket especially the back side were they throw cow heads etc…thats a healthy hazard. …then you move to the CBD.
dont put dirt under the carpet and say u have swept your house dude
Yeah I drove through Mazabuka from Johannesburg with foreign pals recently and I was embarrassed that this mess upon mess upon garbage is one of the famous towns of Zambia. Not that Lusaka is any better.
Wy are still not maintenig the governance system are we still in pf
Yeah I drove through Mazabuka from Johannesburg with foreign pals recently and I was embarrassed that this mess upon mess upon garbage is one of the famous towns of Zambia. Not that Lusaka is any better.