The opposition United Party for National Development, UPND, in Southern province says there is need for the Zambia News and Information Services to intensify voter sensitisation campaigns.

The opposition party said intensifying the campaigns is the only way of encouraging high voter turn out for the October 30 Presidential elections.

UPND Provincial Publicity Secretary, John Chidyaka, said in a statement to ZANIS in Choma today that party is, however, impressed with the civic education campaign being conducted by ZANIS ahead of the elections.

Mr Chidyaka advised government to ensure that ZANIS is adequately funded to enable the media institution reach out to rural areas so that people could be availed information necessary for them to make informed decisions in the polls.

He said the ZANIS infrastructure such as mobile video vans  and Public Address equipment should be put to good
use for the benefit of the public.

ZANIS embarked on a voter sensitization exercise in various district to prepare the electorate for the October 30 presidential poll.

Mobile announcements coupled with night video shows are being conducted in rural areas.

Ends/CM/ZANIS/SJK

Acting President, Rupiah Banda, said this afternoon that government will expedite the purchase of vehicles for chiefs that did not benefit from first consignment.

Speaking after meeting with  Bemba chiefs, Mr Banda said government will endevour to provide Chiefs with requirements that will make their work of governing communities easier.

Earlier, Mr Banda paid a courtesy call on Paramount Chief Chitimukulu of the Bemba people in Mungwi district.

Mr Banda held private talks with the paramount chief for over an hour, before holding a  private meeting other Bemba chiefs.

Mr Banda also met the Kasama Catholic Diocese ArchiBishop James Spaita.

In welcoming the Acting President, Bishop Spaita said the church was praying for the leadership of the country to ensure that the peace which the country has enjoyed continued to prevail.

The Acting President is in Kasama to attend the Ukusefya Pang’wena traditional ceremony of the Bemba people taking place tomorrow in Mungwi.

The Ukusefya Pangw’ena ceremony is commemoration of the movement of the Bemba people from the historical Kola kingdom to Zambia where they settled at Ngw’en village in Mungwi.

ZANIS/ENDS/KSH/SJK

Acting Zambian President Rupiah Banda said he would keep Ng’andu Magande as finance minister if he wins next month’s presidential election, suggesting he will keep to economic policies praised by donors.

Investors are keen to know whether the election will mean policy changes after the death of President Levy Mwanawasa.

Mwanawasa, who died in August after a stroke, was credited with prudent economic management and tackling corruption. He helped turn Africa’s biggest copper producer into a rare success story on the continent.

Banda defeated Magande to become the Movement for Multiparty Democracy’s (MMD) candidate for the October 30 election and the competition for the party leadership had raised questions over the fate of the finance minister and other senior officials.

“I look forward to working with them all the coming years,” said Banda.

If Magande, a tough economic manager with wide experience in government and finance, keeps his job after the election, he is likely to ease any concerns foreign investors may have.

Since 1978, he has been a top negotiator in major financing deals Zambia has signed with major lenders, including the International Monetary Fund. An IMF mission is in Zambia for a periodic review of economic targets, Magande said.

Opposition Patriotic Front leader Michael Sata is expected to be Banda’s main rival.

In an apparent policy shift designed to reassure foreign imvestors, Sata has said he would welcome Chinese investors in the country’s mining industry.

Chinese companies have invested over $500 million in mining and other sectors over the last five years, Treasury data shows.

Magande is credited with helping Mwanawasa usher in strong growth, which averaged 5 percent over the last six years, while inflation declined to single digits in April 2006, for the first time in over three decades.

Banda pledged to protect foreign investors, saying their money generated wealth and jobs for Zambians, many of whom are still impoverished despite economic growth.

“We welcome all foreign investors for as long as they obey the laws of our country and protect our people and the environment. I will in the next few weeks announce new economic measures,” Banda said.

Reuters

Dear LT bloggers,

I would like to ask for advise about my situation. I was found to be HIV positive 7 years ago my wife is negative and we are Zambians living in the United States.
We have been living well for for the past 7years until I discovered that my wife has been cheating on me for a long time.

We have 5 children and have been in marriage for 22 years.This boy friend is claiming one of our young child aged 12 to be his child. Am still living with my wife who is claiming some of the properties we have, saying there are her benefits from our marriage and wants to sell them off and build in her province.
What should I do? Can I divorce and allow her take the properties that I have worked for all my life for her to enjoy with her new boy friend. I do not want to divorce my wife at all and I do not know what to do.

yours

Troubled

LADIES AND PUBLIC TOILETS

-When you have to visit a public toilet, you usually find a line of  women, so you smile politely and take your place.
-Once it’s your turn, you check for feet under the cubicle doors. Every  cubicle is occupied.
-Finally, a door opens and you dash in, nearly knocking down the woman leaving the cubicle. You get in to find the door won’t  latch. It doesn’t matter, the wait has been so long you are about to
wet your pants! nnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn
-The dispenser for the modern ‘seat covers’ (invented by  someone’s Mum, no doubt) is handy, but empty.

-You would hang your bag  on the door hook, if there was one, so you carefully, but quickly  drape it around your neck, (Mum would turn over in her grave if you put it on the FLOOR!) down with your pants and assume “The Stance‘

-In this position, your aging, toneless, thigh muscles  begin to shake. You’d love to sit down, but having not taken time to  wipe the seat or to lay toilet paper on it, you hold ‘The Stance.‘
– To take your mind off your trembling thighs, you reach for  what you discover to be the empty toilet paper dispenser.  In your mind, you can hear your mother’s voice saying,  ‘Dear, if you had tried to clean the seat, you would have KNOWN there  was no toilet paper!’ Your thighs shake more.
-You remember the tiny tissue that you blew your nose on  yesterday – the one that’s still in your bag (the bag around your  neck, that now you have to hold up trying not to strangle yourself at  the same time). That would have to do, so you crumple it in the  puffiest way possible. It’s still smaller than your thumbnail.
-Someone pushes your door open because the latch doesn’t  work. The door hits your bag, which is hanging around your neck  in front of your chest and you and your bag topple backward against  the tank of the toilet.

-‘Occupied!’ you scream, as you reach for the door, dropping your precious, tiny, crumpled tissue in a puddle on the  floor, while losing your footing altogether and sliding down directly  onto the TOILET SEAT.
-It is wet of course. You bolt up, knowing all too well that it’s too  late. Your bare bottom has made contact with every imaginable germ and  life form on the uncovered seat because YOU never laid down toilet

paper – not that there was any, even if you had taken time to try. You know that your mother would be utterly appalled if she  knew, because you’re certain her bare bottom never touched a public  toilet seat because, frankly, dear, ‘You just don’t KNOW what kind of  diseases you could get.
– By this time, the automatic sensor on the back of the  toilet is so confused that it flushes, propelling a stream of water  like a fire hose against the inside of the bowl and spraying a fine  mist of water that covers your bum and runs down your legs and into  your shoes.  The flush somehow sucks everything down with such force  and you grab onto the empty toilet paper dispenser for fear of being  dragged in too.
-At this point, you give up. You’re soaked by the spewing  water and the wet toilet seat. You’re exhausted. You try to wipe with  a sweet wrapper you found in your pocket and then slink out  inconspicuously to the sinks.

-You can’t figure out how to operate the taps with the  automatic sensors, so you wipe your hands with spit and a dry paper  towel and walk past the line of women still waiting.  You are no longer able to smile politely to them.

-A kind  soul at the very end of the line points out a piece of toilet paper trailing from your shoe. (Where was that when you NEEDED it?)  You yank the paper from your shoe, plunk it in the woman’s  hand and tell her warmly, ‘Here, you just might need this.
-As you exit, you spot your hubby, who has long since  entered, used and left the men’s toilet. Annoyed, he asks, ‘What took  you so long and why is your bag hanging around your neck?
This is dedicated to women everywhere who deal with any public rest rooms/toilets (rest??? you’ve GOT to be kidding!!). It  finally explains to the men what really does take us so long. It also answers that other commonly asked question about why women go to the  toilets in pairs.  It’s so the other gal can hold the door, hang onto your bag and hand  you Kleenex under the door.

Hakainde Hichilema

Zambian citizen born in 1962

Married to Mutinta with three (3) children
EDUCATIONAL QUALIFICATION

· BA Economics and Business Administration (University of Zambia)

· MBA Finance and Business Strategy (University of Birmingham, United Kingdom)

· Trained Business Negotiator

· Qualified Change Management Practitioner

· Member – Institute of Directors

RELIGIOUS AFFILIATION

· A Christian who believes that all faiths should be accommodated.
POSITIONS HELD

· Chief Executive, Coopers & Lybrand Zambia 1994 – 1998

· Chief Executive, Grant Thornton Zambia 1998 – 2006
BUSINESS EXPERIENCE

HH served as Chief Executive Officer of Coopers and Lybrand and later Grant Thornton for 12 years, companies he formerly co-owned. Coopers & Lybrand and Grant Thornton are leading international professional services firms providing corporate finance, accounting, auditing, corporate recovery, management consultancy and tax advisory services to several reputable clients. These firms are both member organizations of Coopers & Lybrand International and Grant Thornton International respectively which operate in more than 100 countries world wide.

· HH has been one of the leading lights in business with wide experience in Zambia, Southern Africa, United Kingdom and other countries at operational and executive management levels.

· HH has chaired several international conferences among them the Zambia Investment Opportunities Conference organized by the Financial Times of the United Kingdom held in London in May 1996 and a similar one was held in Lusaka, Zambia in 1997.

· HH is a member of the Institute of Directors for Zambia and believes very strongly that good governance is key to Zambia’s economic development.

· HH is an entrepreneur with a number of private and corporate investments.

· HH is also a large commercial farmer
BOARD OF DIRECTORS

· HH served/serves on numerous (25) boards of corporate entities including;

· Chairman of the Board of Directors – Barclays Bank Zambia Plc.

· Chairman of the Board of Directors – Sun International (Z) Ltd

· First Chairman of the Board of Directors, Africa Trade Insurance (ATI) a multilateral Pan African organization based in Kenya.

· Chairman – Greenbelt Fertilizers Limited

· Chairman – Media Trust Fund

· Chairman – Export Development Programme II

· Director – Zambia Investment Limited

· Director – Seedco Zambia Limited

· Director – African Life Financial Services

· Director – Zambezi Nickel (Bermuda) Limited

· Director – Westlake Investment Ltd. (Mauritius)

· Board Member – Zambia Association of Chambers of Commerce and Industry (ZACCI)

· Member – Zambia Business Forum

· Served for seven years on the Coopers & Lybrand’s Africa Governing Board

· Served on Coopers & Lybrand’s International’s Governance Committee

· Served as Non Executive Director – Zambia Consolidated Copper Mines (Smelterco) Limited

· Served on boards of eight other companies
COMMUNITY SERVICE

· HH is a community man who was born in a village, along the way learning so many things locally and internationally which Zambia can benefit from.

· HH is passionate about community work and has supported many community projects including dip tanks, clinics, schools, boreholes, and dams’ e.t.c over the years.

· HH has helped found a cultural fund aimed at financing the revival of cultural ceremonies in Zambia. Among the ceremonies supported by the fund include Kulamba Kubwalo of the Soli people in Central Zambia, Likumbi Lyamize of the Luvale people in North Western Zambia, Kusefya Pa Ng’wena of the Bemba People in Northern Zambia, Kuomboka of the Lozi people in Western Zambia, Lwiindi in Southern Zambia, Nc’wala of the Ngoni people in Eastern Zambia, Shimunenga among many others.

· HH is an employer of Zambians in urban areas through companies and rural communities through his farming activities. HH clearly understands rural and urban poverty and has contributed in someway in alleviating poverty.

· HH is one of the founder members and supporters of UPND.
OTHER ATTRIBUTES

· HH has been active in the business community and has a strong high level private and public sector network locally and internationally.

· HH has lived and worked in the United Kingdom and traveled widely around the world on business and leisure.
WRITTEN ATTRIBUTES

· An Economic Analysis of Determinants of Government Budget Deficits – The case of Zambia, 1986.

· Managing Businesses in the third world Privatized Environment – The Zambian Case, 1992.

· Numerous lecture materials, occasional papers, consultancy and advisory reports
WHAT HH BRINGS INTO ZAMBIAN POLITICS

· Focus on a new vision for Zambia and promote love in the country.

· Strong, humble and knowledge based leadership.

· Quality leadership with a difference

· Focus on service to the nation and not benefit to self (Servant leadership).

· Ensure racial harmony in society

· Promote unity, embracing all regions and tribal groupings as the nation belongs to all.

· Clean politics that are issue based, not personality and insult based.

· Promote professionalism, integrity and ethical conduct in public office.

· Improve the working conditions in the public service including those of our men and women in uniform so as to improve service delivery to the public.

· Economic development and prosperity for all.

· Promote peace and constitutionalism – give Zambians the constitution speedily.

· Facilitate the enactment of a new electoral law acceptable to all Zambians.

· Promote freedom of the press through enactment of appropriate laws.

· A leadership that promotes gender equity and effective participation of differently-abled, women and the youth in public affairs.

· Focus on key economic sectors such as agriculture, tourism, mining, manufacturing, energy services.

· Promote employment creation and entrepreneurship.

· Fight poverty; promote economic business and investment growth to support social sectors.

· Taking a building block approach to running the country carrying on with the good aspects of previous Governments and only change those that are wrong

· Improve sanitation and facilities in public markets so that marketers can operate in safe and decent conditions.

· Change with continuity and not continuity with change.

· Moving away from politics of anger, vindictiveness and revenge

· De-politicize the public service and strengthen public institutions to deal with among other things, the fight against corruption.

· Drive the decentralization agenda effectively.

· Vigorously fight HIV/AIDS.

· Give our country a fresh and better start.

· Speedy payment of retirement benefits to retirees to enable them start a new life.

· Work to end endemic strikes in the nation.

· Will take advise from past leaders, professionals, churches, traditional rulers, women and youth.

Some Kanyama residents chanted anti-MMD slogans when Acting President Rupiah Banda visited Kanyama Clinic and threatened that they would not vote for the ruling party in the forthcoming polls if government did not address the problems that Kanyama clinic was facing.

Some residents cited power outages as one of the major problem that the Clinic was experiencing in the provision of better health services to the community.

They threatened that they would not support the ruling MMD party in the forthcoming October 30 presidential election if government did not procure a generator in order to address the power outages that the clinic was experiencing.

The Acting President was accompanied by MMD National Chairman Michael Mabenga, MMD National Secretary Katele Kalumba, MMD Campaign Manager for Mr Banda Mike Mulongoti and Presidential Affairs Minister Cecil Holmes.

Others were Lusaka Province Minister Lameck Mangani, Home Affairs Minister Ronnie Shikapwasha and other senior government and party officials.

And usiness yesterday came to a stand-still for over 30 minutes as Acting President Rupiah Banda launched the MMD party campaigns in Lusaka’s Soweto and City markets respectively.

People who came from different walks of life lined-up in a queue along the Los Angeles road trying to get a glimpse as the Acting President was leaving for City Market were he launched his campaigns in readiness for the forthcoming October 30 presidential election.

Mr. Banda, who first toured Kanyama Clinic before going to City Market, was received by scores of Kanyama residents and MMD party members.

Some MMD party members and some Kanyama residents chanted slogans in support of the adoption of Mr. Banda as the MMD party presidential candidate in the forthcoming October 30 presidential election.

ZANIS/TK/AM/ENDS

A clergyman says Acting President Rupiah Banda must be applauded for his decision not to sign legislation on the proposed pay rise for constitution office holders.

Bishop John Mambo told ZANIS in an interview that the move by the Acting President to take the bill back to parliament for reconsideration must be supported by all well-meaning Zambians.

Acting President Rupiah Banda has announced that he would not sign legislation on the proposed pay rise for constitution office holders and has since promised to take the bill back to parliament for reconsideration.

Officially launching the ruling Movement for Multiparty Democracy (MMD) campaigns for the October 30th, 2008 presidential by-election at Lusaka’s Intercontinental hotel today, Mr. Banda said he had heard the concerns of many Zambian over the proposed increase of salaries for constitutional office holders.

Bishop Mambo, who is also Chikondi Foundation Founder and President, said the proposed pay rise was initially made in bad faith and was uncalled for as many Zambians were wallowing in abject poverty.

He said they are many needy areas that require urgent attention which make an upward adjustment of salaries and allowances for constitutional office bearers secondary.

Bishop Mambo cited doctors at the University Teaching Hospital, lecturers at the University of Zambia and lowly paid civil servants as some that need urgent attention.

He said the obtaining poverty levels did allow for a selected few individuals to get a larger part of the national cake to the disadvantage of the majority Zambians.

Bishop Mambo further pointed out that efforts to service the hiked salaries and allowances for conditional office holders that include the president and ministers would have put a strain on the national coffers.

He said resources which should have gone towards developmental efforts would have been diverted to meet the scaled up salaries and allowances for the constitutional office bearers.

Bishop Mambo said individuals should enter politics with a view of serving the nation not seeking to enrich themselves.

A few weeks ago, Members of Parliament debated a bill and approved it proposing that there be a 15 per cent pay rise on salaries and other allowances of constitution office holders.

Legislation on the proposed pay rise for constitution office holders that include the president and ministers further sought to introduce new allowances such as responsibility allowance.

ENDS/AM/MM/ZANIS