public relations understanding among the youths

Public relations is a complex field, not only because it demands the mastery of a diversity of skills, but also because it requires a considerable amount of brainpower for problem solving, counseling, planning and creativity in approaching situations. Adding to the mental stimulation is the high competition in public relations, which is usually matched by corresponding high paybacks. The profession takes a specific type of person who can campaign, plan or appeal effectively to an organisation’s publics. This is because there is nothing more indivisible in an organisation than its reputation and the cordial climate in which it operates. Therefore, it is imperative that an institution’s public relations is unified as the antenna, the conscience and voice of the whole establishment.


Additionally, public relations helps to develop an outward-looking managerial philosophy which should be translated into actions that prove the organisation’s concern to the public interest. This can be accomplished by listening and responding to the public needs effectively. It entails working to interpret the needs of the public to the organisation and plan responsive actions by the institution in relation to those needs. Listening and responding effectively go together, and when they do, the conscience of management takes a new perspective as inconsistent institutional policies cannot be made effective by any public relations effort.

Based on the above arguments, the core thesis of this essay is to compare and contrast public relations in business, non-profit organisations and in government, bearing in mind the principles and theories of the profession’s practice. Furthermore, the question on which one adheres more to the principles and ethics of the profession will be expounded on. The essay will be logically divided into three parts, the first consisting of definitions of key terms. The second part will be the main body, while the last will be the conclusion. Only few similarities and differences in business, government and non-profit organisations public relations will be expounded on in this essay as they are too numerous to exhaust.

Public relations is a multidimensional concept without a universally agreed definition to it. William (1963: 987) for example, defines it as activities and policies devoted to build public interest in an idea, person, product, institution or business establishment, with the ultimate goal of creating an advantageous “image” for any kind of an establishment in order to enhance good public will in the most favourable light. The focal point of the profession is to help entities develop a mutually satisfactory two-way communication system which helps them win the cooperation of the groups of people they are dealing with at different levels by taking their interests on board. This can be accomplished by listening and responding to those interests effectively.

Principally, public relations is a public service oriented profession, with public interest (not personal remunerations), as the primary consideration in its practice. This principal is supposed to be universal to the profession, in whatever atmosphere it is being practiced, be it in business, government or non-profit institution. This also can be a truism under democratic governments, where those who govern are chosen by the people as their representatives in decision making and formulation of laws that protect electorates’ interests and needs. According to www.wadsworth.com, “governments today, (unlike dictatorships and monarchs) are generally expected to provide various welfare services to the public, which give the public relations personnel very challenging duties of explaining new policies, conducting campaigns for set goals, attend to gender issues, human rights, youth empowerment, sensitisation of the public on safety, interpretation of national public opinion to assist in domestic policy formulation, defending controversial expenditures of tax payers’ money, among others.” This means governments take on board interests of different publics they deal with, like the ordinary people, tax payers’ who contribute to governance financially, opposition political parties, and even interest of the governors, among others.

This is because government touches every aspect of society and virtually every part of government is closely tied to and reliant upon public relations. The purpose of democracy itself closely matches the purpose of public relations as the philosophy promotes public service or rule of the people, by the people or representative leadership. Therefore, government public relations personnel commonly known as public information officers must help government officials undertake programmes that address public needs with the urgency they require in order to gain public good will and confidence. All institutions strive to attain this. They employ different public relations techniques that they aim to get credit for. They all communicate their policies and acts to people’s needs so that people understand and appreciate what an institution is doing for their welfare.

Businesses have collapsed, governments have fallen and non-profit organisations have folded, because of poor or lack of public support. Thus, all institutions have realised the role of public relations for their survival. They therefore explain and justify their actions in the best way possible to the public so that the public knows what the entities are doing to satisfy their (people) interest.

Image building is another aspect that public relations has struggled to accomplish either in business, government or non-profit organisations. This involves presenting and building good will for the establishment by demonstrating to the public that the firm is an effective provider of goods or services, an equitable employer and or\ responsible community neighbour. The responsibility of the public relations people here is to tell the entity’s story well when controversy arises. According to Day (2000: 231), “public relations personnel have the duty to design policies and help management in administering various responsive programmes to public needs in relation to those needs’ scope and complexity in all spheres of their operations.” In short, they must initiate programmes that explain their establishment’s goals and objectives towards the welfare of all the publics the establishment is dealing with at different levels.

The most prominent ways in which public relations people accomplish image building or enhancement are through research, communication, publicity, planning and counseling. Research is used to increase understanding of the audience attitudes towards an organisation so that it can structure appropriate messages to address pertinent issues that can enhance relationships between the institution and its publics. It provides feedback since two-way communication is inevitable for the institution to make necessary adjustments to its policies and practices. For example, the government of Zambia wanted to put in place legislation that would regulate non-governmental organisations due to some observations from certain quarters of society on the organisations’ active participation in national matters, which was seen as one way of trying to control government. But after a strong resistance and criticisms from various publics, the decision was rescinded. Government tried to fine tune messages to the public to sugar coat the reasons for such a move, but the public never bent down.

Research generally helps in determining attitudes and behaviours of the public for ease planning of public relations strategies for persuading publics and influences them in order to generate mutual understanding. Non-profit organisations often use research to ascertain acceptability of their programmes or services by the public. Different methods are used in ascertaining people’s attitude towards an establishment’s policies or practices. They can be formal or informal. Many of them use suggestion boxes or open letters to the organisation by the public.

According to Young (1996: 124), “there can be no public relations without communication because surveillance of the ‘market’ and what it offers through feedback will not be accomplished as ascertaining public attitude will be impossible.” Every public relations person looks at the best way of reaching their organisation’s publics with information well tailored to meet their concerns. These professions seek to gain public acceptance of their institutions. As information managers, public relations people use communication to inform, persuade, and building mutual relations between an establishment and is publics. The messages are thus designed in a way that they appeal to people’s tastes and needs in the best way possible.

It is further argued that in government-as in any other organisation-public relations is a management function that helps to define objectives and philosophies while also helps the organisation adapt to the demand of its constituencies and environment. Public relations practitioners whether referred to as public information officers, press secretaries or just plain administrative aides, still communicate with all relevant internal and external publics to make organisational goals and societal expectations consistent. Public relations people in all sectors develop, execute and evaluate programmes that promote the exchange of influential ideas and understanding an organisation’s constituent parts and publics.

In addition, planning in any kind of public relations is said to be essential not only to know where the message or campaign is headed, but also to win top management support. For example, as governments become more complex and everywhere, the challenge of maintaining citizen involvement in national matters and ensuring that governments are responsive to societal needs become more difficult. In such instances, there is need to employ public relations techniques in convincing citizens to have confident in their leaders and understand that government is committed to meet their concerns. In the process of planning, the organisation’s objectives and goals, among other aspects are considered. The broad environment in which an establishment operates dictates its overall objectives, which in turn dictate specific public relations objectives and strategies. This requires quick thinking and creativity to achieve recognition by the public that the institution is doing something concerning their welfare.

Planning is cardinal for the success of any programme. Therefore, public relations people in any setting should specify a series of things to be done and how they will be done. Planning starts with acquiring background information to the problem or issue, and then make an outline of strategies to tackle it. For instance, in ascertaining economic activities in Zambia, especially the level of local people’s participation in these activities, the problems they face among other concerns, the country embarked on an economic census. It is expected that a plan of action will thus be taken to empower local people in one way or the other after identifying how they are fairing. This gives people the view that their government cares about their well being, and they are likely to support it in different ways when need arises.

The plan is implemented after doing all the house work. Public relations tactics are often used here to convince the public that the plan of action is meant to benefit them. Organisations often claim credit for their public welfare concern and for their ability to keep a finger on the pulse of what they promise to do for their community neighbour, (ibid: 126). Success of the plan is known by evaluation.

Counseling is the other pertinent aspect of public relations in any institution. It is argued that public relations is the ear and conscious of any institution, with one foot in the institution and the other outside. Its practitioners therefore dart ahead of other professionals, survey the public attitudes, tastes, needs and the like, and then provide advice to management concerning an entity’s policies, relationships with the publics and effective communication (op.city: 127-8). Through counseling, public relations people advise management and other key publics on the importance of maintaining a good relationship for mutual benefits of co-existing.

The other aspect of public relations in all organisations or establishments is achieving visibility through publicity. Although it is argued that performance should precede publicity, many institutions use a lot of marketing strategies to present a positive image of their entity before the public in order to gain good will. Good publicity can be earned by doing right things to the community the institution serves. It also involves using appropriate medium and having positive media relations to gain it. Planned messages should therefore be disseminated through the right selected media in order to further an entity’s interests. Good public relations is vital in the achievement of good publicity.

However, regardless of many similarities which exist in public relations in business, non-profit organisations and government, the way the profession is practiced differs in one or the other. According to Cutlip at el (2000: 457), “the main objective of employing public relations in profit making organisations is to gain public acceptance which might reciprocate in increased profitability of the organisation’s activities as people tend to buy more of a company’s product when they accept its policies and practices.” This is slightly different from the core objective of engaging public relations strategies in government and non-profit organisations. Under the auspices of government and non-profit organisations, the main motive of employing public relations in whatever form is to gain public acceptance of their public service missions and objectives. A variety of challenges face these institutions in public service, such as high demand for the services (like medical or education services), high costs and even access to these services by the least advantaged members of society; some of which providers face surmounting criticism and pressure. Therefore, public relations is often called upon to provide positioning statements and respond to critics. In short, government and non-profit organisations are mainly in public service, while the businesses are after increasing their profitability.

The other difference between businesses and government and non-profit organisations is on what happens to monies that are not spent on overhead and operating expenses. In a business, this money is called ‘profit,’ and it is distributed on a proportional basis to those who own the company. Thus, someone who owns more shares of the company gets more from that profit than those with less. However, when it comes to a non-profit organisation or government, the excess monies are called ‘surplus’ and they are often re-invested in the organisation or government sectors to strengthen and expand the scope of their objectives and goals. Governments strive to attain equity on the provision of services to the public regardless of how much they contributed to the country’s tax base. Non-profit organisations equally aim at supplementing governments in the provision of the much needed services by the public on an equitable basis. But this is not the case when it comes to businesses. Therefore, the kind of public relations employed by these institutions should reciprocate into the achievement of the mission of the entity’s establishment.

Additionally, businesses employ public relations strategies for the ultimate benefit of increasing returns for the owners of the money that have been injected in the running of such businesses. According to Lucas (2001: 89), “business organisations use public relations to create a favourable image that would in return result in increased buying of their products or services in order to make more money for the owners of the businesses, as a way of financially rewarding them for their investment in the company or organisation.” On the other hand, a non-profit organisation focuses on fulfilling an educational or charitable mission, with recognition that all organisations must maintain positive bottom lines to exist. The same philosophy applies in governments as they aim at meeting their ordained functions vested on them by the public. Governments that have failed to live to the public’s expectations have fallen, as the people rose against them. The best example is the assignation of President Mobutu Tsetseko of Zaire (by then) due to the failure of his administration to provide basic needs to the public. It lost public trust.

Furthermore, non-profit organisations especially social welfare agencies and governments often rely on inexperienced public relations practitioners or even unprofessional volunteers or appointees to conduct their public relations programmes. They often argue that they do not have resources to engage the depth of public relations expertise necessary to mount sophisticated public relations or marketing efforts. But when it comes to business, public relations practitioners are employed and maintained in the organisation on the basis on their performance. The practitioners are research based strategic planners with considerably higher funding and support from management.

Government public relations is said to be coupled with propaganda in different faces as a way of winning public support especially during crises rather than performance. The public is sometimes given misleading information as a way of cushion hostility. For example, church leaders are sometimes used as a device to achieve credibility on policies or decisions that society does not promote. Other strategies which present the decision or idea as having “overwhelming support” are used to gain public support. The public often does not get the concealed truth in whichever way because governments use laws like State Security laws as a way of shutting the media and the public up on issues that may need urgent attention. For example, President Mwanawasa once warned those who were daring the National Constitution Conference (NCC) that they risked committing a treasonable case whose penalty was either death or life imprisonment. Many people thus conceded with the NCC idea as a mode of enacting the new constitution in fear of the ‘law.’ Bribery of opinion leaders is also used sometimes to win public support.

But when it comes to businesses and non-profit organisations, state inquiries through state agencies are in most cases used to get the truth, and when organisations are found faulting, they are penalized in one way or the other. In turn, customers may shun such institutions’ products or services. That means those who entrusted their capital in such ventures lose their money. As a result, open communication to a large extent characterises the business fraternity and non-profit organisations.

Government public relations professionals also face more hostility and suspicion than do other practitioners, which stem from the continuing struggle between the press fighting for the ‘right of the people to know’ and officials of government who insist upon discretion of certain sensitive areas of the public sphere. In addition, the hostility also stems from protests by industries, institutions and other vested interests when threatened by proposed legislation or government regulation. According to Bjornland (1993: 234), “government public relations is the most frustrating profession as practitioners are often dealing with an apathetic and poorly educated citizenry who do not understand the issue, the problem or the reasons behinds unpopular decision.” Worse still, this is often coupled with the popular perception of government as a gridlock, a maze of red tape, full of special interests, corruption, ineptitude and partisan politics. This is not the case to practitioners in non-profit organisations and business fraternity where the administration is considerably small and less bureaucratic.

Taking the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) code of conduct as a measure of levels of adherence to the public relations principles and ethics by business, government and non-profit organisation public relations, the business fraternity to a large extent adheres more to the public relations principles and ethics than the rest. According to the PRSA code of conduct, public relations practitioners should base their professional principles and ethics on the fundamental value and dignity of an individual and serving the interests of the clients, employers and other publics. They must be dedicated to the goals of better communication, understanding and cooperation among the diverse individual groups and institutions of society and conduct themselves professionally with the truth, accuracy, fairness and responsibility to their publics.

In line with the guidelines above among others, the efforts of public relations in business are often designed to improve public attitude towards the business. According to Hayden (1975: 14-18), “to operate effectively in business, public relations professionals must be aware of the principles and practices in the profession thoroughly, understand the communication process, importance of research, instincts of planning and implementation of the plan, and even the profession’s publics.” To accomplish this, public relations in business has been characterised by a high professional management level in an organisation which follows a research based strategic planning system with considerable funding and management support and outside consultancy when need arises. Such result oriented public relations does not take root in most non-profit organisations and governments for various reasons among them lack of funds.

Public relations practitioners in business are compelled to follow prescribed professional codes of conduct as businesses often operate under the surveillance of government agencies and other organisations concerned with consumer interests. These regulations are somehow relaxed when it comes to non-profit organisations as they are considered ‘good guys of society’ because they are perceived to be more concerned with the welfare of the people. For example, there are those non-profit organisations that supplement government efforts in areas of education or health, which many governments are striving to address due to the high demand by the public for those services. People exalt such organisations, for example, community schools run by churches and other organisations in Zambia, which target low income populations.

Contrary, business public relations practitioners must aim at enhancing their organisation’s credibility by building a firm foundation of honest performance, open communication, remove inconsistencies between performance and communication, commitment to problem solving and avoidance of creating expectations that cannot be met. According to www.wadsworth.com, “many non-profit organisations have taken advantage of relaxed government regulations on their operations in essence of ‘supplementing’ government efforts in improving standards of living of the people; and have ventured into buying debts on the secondary global market at a discount in line with Debt Swaps arrangements and later demand high pay from debtors without repercussions.” A recent example could be the case of Zambia over the voucher fund, where Donegal International bought Zambia’s US$2.3 million debt in the 1970s at US$200 thousand in pretence that the organisation had citizen empowerment programmes to carry out in the country using the price differential, but later demanded for US$15 million from the Zambian government. The organisation was not scrunitised or monitored to ensure that its claims were met. But when it comes to businesses, they are always under the ‘camera’ thus the public relations practiced under them is more sensitive to the environments the entities operate under.

Although there are no universally agreed upon principles or ethical codes of conduct in public relations being that what could be ethically right to someone may not be with the other, there is need to strike a considerable balance of interests of an organisation’s publics. This is because every profession must operate under some professional codes of conduct which separate it from other occupations. To this effect, the PRSA have clauses that oblige public relations practitioners to conduct their professional life in accordance to public interest and should exercise high standards of honesty and integrity and to deal fairly with the public. (But the practice differs due to certain advantages other entities enjoy.) To businesses, all publics counts as money for their sustenance comes from people, whom without they cannot survive. This is slightly different in case of non-profit organisations or governments whose funding is often from abroad or from tax payers’ who are obliged to pay tax by law.

Equally, when it comes to government, there are a lot of laws that are used to protect the leadership from being ousted for failure to meet public demands. For example, in Zambia, no one can sue the state for failure to meet their social and economic rights like education. The state is protected by law. It is on this basis that some scholars have argued that government public relations is more of propaganda and waste of public funds. For instances, in the United States, there is a law which allows certain things to remain secrets for twenty years even when what has happened is worthy the removal of the government in power. Governments are in such cases painted in the favourable light they do not deserve merely to hold on to power.

In conclusion, public relations’ major responsibility in all institutions is to present those institutions in the most favourable light that ‘meets’ diverse publics’ interests. But due to variations in environments of operation, there have been differences in carrying out these responsibilities. This has been worsened by the fact that there are no universally agreed upon principles or ethics under which all public relations practitioners should operate under. What could be ethically right to one practitioner may be wrong to the other based on the differences in ideological alignments, beliefs, attitudes and or\ commitment to professional code of conduct and personal values among other elicits of human or professional preferences. This indicates that the complex aspects of institutions public relations practitioners work for and intellectual honesty and integrity in all features of public relations requires proper understanding of the professional principles and ethics and how an individual practitioner is expected to conduct oneself by the public they serve in order to improve on the professional efficacy. It is therefore the duty of public relations practitioners to safeguard diligently their profession, the image of their institutions and interests of their publics on a balanced scale.


BIBLIOGRAPHY

Bjornland L. (1993), PR Case Studies Book: 100 PR Case Studies. Gale Research Centre. New York.

Cutlip at el (2000), Effective PR (8th Ed). Delhi: Pearson Education Inc.

Day A. (2000), Ethics in Media Communication: Cases and Controversies (3rd Ed). Louisiana: Louisiana State University Press.

Hayden R. (1975), The Reality of PR. Belmont: Wadsworth Publishing Inc.

Lucas S.E. (2001), The Art of Public Speaking (7th Ed). Boston: McGraw-Hill.

Young D. (1996), Building your Company’s Good Will. New York: AMA Press.

William B. (1963), The Columbia Encyclopedia (3rd Ed). New York: Columbia University Press.

www.wadswrth.com

gender and young people

INTRODUCTION
Incidences of gender inequality between men and women have been a serious source of public and private concern in Zambia and other parts of the world in regard to the prospects of good governance, national and global development at large. Therefore, there has been great emphasis from the world governments and non governmental organisations to close the gap between the two sexes by promoting women empowerment as women have been marginalised in many spheres of life. It was considered important for women to be given equal opportunities so that they could compete with their men folk in developmental issues and other areas of living. This is because women have been rated as inferior as compared to men in almost all sectors of life.

Campaigns and sensitisation programmes have been going on to promote women empowerment so that there are no gender imbalances between women and men. In the view of these cross-cutting gender imbalances in the country, the Zambian government formulated and adopted a holistic National Gender Policy in relation to the Beijing 1995 United Nations Fourth Conference on Gender Equality. The Policy stressed the need to fully integrate women in economic growth and ensure that both men and women participate fully and equitably benefit from the development process of the country.

Based on the above concerns, the core thesis of this essay is to discuss how gender mainstreaming has been implemented in Zambia. The fact that gender mainstreaming involves putting in place measures that promote gender equality and empowerment of women and men in various sectors will be taken into account in the handling of the discussion. Additionally, possible weaknesses and strengthens of the measures that have been put in place will be identified. The essay comprises four parts. The first part is the introduction, the second consists defines of key concepts, while the third is the main body. The last part is a personal conclusion as way of wrapping up the task.

DEFINITION OF CONCEPTS
According to the United Nations Economic and Social Council (1997: 35), “gender mainstreaming is a strategy for making women and men’s concerns and experiences an integral dimension of the policies and programmes on all political, economic and social spheres so that women and men benefit equally and inequality is not perpetuated.” This entails that gender mainstreaming does not only involve restricting efforts to promote equality to the implementation of specific measures that are meant to empower women, but mobilising general policies and measures specifically for the purpose of achieving equality. It is argued that equality can be achieved by actively and openly taking into account possible effects of the policies on the equality of men and women, their experiences and background from the planning stage. This means examining the measures and policies of empowerment and gender equality systematically, taking into account possible hindrances or challenges that affect a particular gender when defining and implementing them.

Additionally, Chiluba (2000: vi) defines gender equality as a situation where men and women have equal conditions for realising their full human rights and potential to contribute to and benefit from socio-economic, cultural and political development of a nation taking into consideration their similarities, differences and varying roles that they play. In a similar but parallel vein, empowerment refers to the process of gaining access to resources and developing one’s capacities with the view to participating actively in shaping one’s own life and that of one’s community in economic, socio-cultural, political and religious terms, (ibid: v).

MAIN BODY
Zambia experienced a positive economic performance in the immediate post-independence period. Economic growth rates were relatively high, and social and economic infrastructure were rapidly expanding mainly in health, education, transport and manufacturing sectors. Employment opportunities equally increased significantly. Consequently, Zambians made substantial gains in income levels, life expectancy and school enrollment, as well as reduction in morbidity and mortality levels.

Despite the gains that were made by the country, participation and benefits from these socio-economic developments were not equitably shared among Zambians because no policies were put in place to ensure equity, especially taking into consideration the disadvantaged position of women and girls. In a culture that favoured men and treated women as minors, both in pre and post independence period, women were marginalised in terms of access to education, employment and other social services. For instance, education and training were culturally considered men’s domain resulting in less women receiving the service. The net effect of this has been high levels of illiteracy among women as compared to men. Similarly, in employment, women were treated as minors who could not do certain jobs or own certain assets without the consent of fathers, husbands or uncles. Employment opportunities were limited for women given their lack of education background and the lack of supportive legislation and gender sensitive policies.

According to the Economic Commission for Africa (2005: 11), “all over the world, education for girls and women is currently recognised as a strategy of achieving gender equality and empowering women.” It is widely accepted that an educated woman is more likely to marry later, to space her pregnancies, to have fewer children, to seek medical care for herself and her children and to adopt good hygiene in her household. In line with this view, the Zambian government adopted a vision and mission that capture gender in its 1996 National Policy on Education. The mission is dubbed, “Education Our Future,” and it states that: “…to guide the provision of education for all Zambians so that they are able to pursue knowledge and skills, manifest excellence in performance and moral uprightness, defend democratic ideals, and accept and value other persons on the basis of their personal worthy and dignity irrespective of gender, religion, ethnic origin or any other discriminatory characteristic,” (GIDD 2002: 12).

The recognition of the importance of education in a person’s life prompted Zambia to make education a right to every person. Therefore, since independence, Zambia incorporated education in the country’s socio-economic development plans. Thus, the post independence era was characterised by rapid expansion of primary and secondary education facilities in all the administrative provinces available at the time. Both basic and high school enrollments showed dramatic increase especially with the introduction of basic schools. This increase however did not record serious performance and participation of girls in education as it mainly put the boy child on the upper hand. According to Central Statistical Office (1996: 34), “at high school level, the proportion of girls in school has been below 40% for a long time regardless of the measures that have been put in place to bring about gender equality.”

Additionally, lack of qualified female role models have attributed to the detrimental motivation and advancement of the girl child education. Some scholars argue that there is need for female role models that the girl child would look up to as she conceptualise her ambitions in education. Civil societies took a leading role in advocating for the empowerment of women and the girl child in Zambia. For example, gender issues in education have been addressed through the Programme for the Advancement of Girls’ Education (PAGE), which starting in 2003, which was mainstreamed into the school system. The Forum for African Women Educationist in Zambia (FAWEZA) is also influential in this area among other organisations. These organisations advocated for ‘back to school’ programmes for girls who fell pregnant while in school, scholarships to vulnerable girls, among other incentives that are meant to encourage the girl child go to school.

Health was another area which due to the decline in the provision of quality health care, impacted negatively on women and children as they are the major users of the health services. A number of strategies have been adopted to lead to equitable access of health care by all Zambians, to enable them to lead socially and economically productive lives. Gender mainstreaming has been identified as one of the strategies, which became a new concept in the health programming. These imbalances in terms of accessing health services between men and women have been perpetuated by the failure to recognise the vital role gender plays in planning and health development. This has been one of the deterrent factors in achieving success in the area of equality in accessing health care despite having health reforms in place.

In the Health Reforms, the mission statement for gender and health is on the creation of necessary conditions for every person, male or female, young and old, to be able to live a healthy life. However, some of the factors that affect the utilisation of health services in Zambia by men and women are enshrined in socialisation and beliefs. For example, Family Planning Services still target females only leaving out men who are actually the decision makers with regard to participation in sexual and reproductive health service activities. Long distances, poor road networks, and women’s poor attitudes towards their health have been some of the other barriers to effective access to health facilities especially by women. Besides the barriers above, sexually transmitted diseases and HIV\AIDS infections have proven to be another health challenge, which mainly affect women more than men due to both biological and social factors. Biologically, women are prone to abrasion and lacerations during sexual intercourse and are more likely to engage into risky sexual activities due to their socio-economic status since the economy is more of a patriarchy nature.

Therefore, the National Gender Policy has contributed towards achieving gender equality in accessing healthy services in that it has decentralised the health system to district level. This was meant to help government medical centres to provide services adequately and to bring the centres closer to the people. In rural areas, Community Based Health Service providers have been introduced who are trained on basic healthy issues and provided with some drugs to administer to community members sick of manageable diseases at that level. In addition, because of the policy, family planning matters which were in the past seen to be a concern of women alone are being discussed with men in various clinics in the country. Men are educated on the ways of family planning. Furthermore; there are now a lot of counseling centres where young people can go for counsel and guidance on sexuality and other HIV\AIDS issues to both males and females that they might not understand well. As a way of reducing infant mortality and maternal deaths, Healthy Reforms have led to free medical services for children under the age of five and expectant mothers. Mothers therefore go for regular post natal check-ups at the clinic or hospital free of charge.

Water and sanitation is the other area of concern that the National Gender Policy had to address. The water infrastructure was largely dilapidated in the 1990s leading to a situation where the quality of water supplied to the public in rural and peri-urban areas was inadequate and of poor quality. This subjected women to walk long distances as they are traditionally considered haulers and providers of water for domestic consumption. This had cut-off women from other productive areas in the economy. In an effort to reverse this situation, the government embarked on a major Sector Reform Programme by adopting and implementing the National Water Policy, whose overall objective is to achieve universal access to clean, safe adequate and reliable water supply and sanitation services. This policy promotes sustainable water resources development and facilitates the equitable provision of quality water for all users at acceptable costs while ensuring security of supply. The policy seeks to support measures aimed at increasing accessibility to safe and clean water and sanitation facilities and the sharing of costs.

Women have also been disadvantaged in the areas of labour, employment and social security, which the National Gender Policy tried to address when it came into effect. According to Mbula (2001: 43-44), “women were seriously discriminated in all avenues of employment during the implementation of structural adjustment policies, which entailed considerable retrenchment from the formal sector, and women were the first ones to be retrenched as they were concentrated in less skilled occupations.” Furthermore, the demand for women’s labour has been weakened by their additional function of reproduction as a result they tend to be less favoured when it comes to recruitment and usually the first to be let out when retrenching. To this effect, the National Gender Policy has a variety of labour laws that seek to regulate and fight gender inequality in workplaces. The Policy acknowledges the fact that men are more conversant with their rights and freedom in the world of work than women; as such women are usually discriminated against. Thus, the Policy made any form of discrimination illegal under the labour laws.

Lack of equitable distribution of resources between males and females was also rife in the acquisition and ownership of land in the 1980s and 1990s. According to Siachiyako (2006: 32), “in the 1980s most of the land in Zambia was dominantly under mutative communal system, whose tenure systems were either patriarchal or matrilineal in nature, which denied women access to land unless through their brothers, husbands, fathers or sons.” This has however continued to be a major hindrance to women’s effective participation in national development. To liberalise Land Acquisition and its usage, the government passed the Land Act, Cap.184 of the Laws of Zambia in 1996 to provide women the possibility of being land owners with security of tenure for 99 years.

In addition to land acquisition challenges, the ownership of houses by the Local Authorities discriminated women against owning houses through housing policies since independence. For example, these policies only allowed married women to own a house after they obtained a written prior consent from their spouses. In trying to address these problems, government adopted a National Housing Policy in 1995, which saw the sell of government houses to sitting tenants at cheaper prices regardless of their sex or economic status.

Furthermore, agriculture was another area that gender mainstreaming aspects have been implemented in Zambia. The majority Zambians earn their livelihood from small scale farming with women contributing 70% agricultural labour. Women participate in both cash and food crop production. According to Nyanga (2006: 07), “women bear the primary responsibilities of household food security, health and nutrition of their families despite being disadvantaged in accessing agricultural inputs, credit, land, and technology and making decisions on agrarian efficacy.” Therefore, the agriculture policy and planning systems have taken into account the central role of women in agricultural production and natural resource management. The Policy argues that sustainable household food security and poverty alleviation would only be achieved through integration and mainstreaming of gender at all levels. Successful integration and mainstreaming of the gender approach into institutional setting require the operationalisation of gender into specific goals, objective and action plans (ibid).

The National Gender Policy also made great strives in eliminating the stereotype portrayal of women in images and presentation in the media. The media was dominated by men who in turn dominated positions of decision making in the fraternity. The government redressed this by adopting the Information and Media Policy with a vision of promoting an efficient and self-motivated media industry, capable of delivering objective and timely information buffer-zone to all by the year 2000. The Policy also intended to promote and safeguard freedom of the press and expression, people’s right to information and encourages private sector participation in the print and electronic media. This was aimed at providing women with information which they have been deprived of especially those in rural areas.

The National Gender Policy also promoted equitable gender representation at all levels of decision making positions through affirmative action, the empowerment and improvement of women’s social, economic and political status. Women have been under-represented at all levels of decision making especially in government, parliament and the private sector over time, which the Policy meant to address. This has been perpetuated by low education attainment, traditional gender attitudes and prejudices among men and women and women’s weak economic status.

STRENGTHS OF THE GENDER EQUALITY MEASURES
The National Gender Policy has formulated a holistic approach to gender inequality challenges that discriminate women against full participation in many activities in the nation and equitably benefit from the development process attained in the country. The Policy puts forward gender mainstreaming issues and concerns that needed to be addressed for gender equality in the social, economic, political and other spheres of society to be attained in Zambia. The Policy entails the mobilisation of all general policies and resources for the purpose of achieving equality by actively and openly taking into account women and men’s concerns at the planning stage.

It provides terms of reference on strategies that can be used in all areas to address women and men’s concerns and experiences. The terms of reference are a ‘conscious’ which aims at integrating both men and women in all political, economical and social avenues. The Policy has impacted positively on gender mainstreaming in that it ensures there are actions that promote equality in the country with an ambitious approach which presupposes identifying men and women’s capacities to contribute to national development or in the areas of decision making. The Policy promotes the enhancement of long term changes in parental roles, family structures, institutional practices and other avenues that have perpetuated gender inequality. For example, in education, the Policy brought forward the implementation of programmes that have provided women opportunities to access education even after getting pregnant. Additionally, community schools have been opened in many parts of the country to supplement on government and private schools’ carrying capacities.

The Policy has also promoted the formulation of legislation that addresses gender violence issues. This has led to the setting up of departments like the Victim Support Unit (VSU) where all forms of harassment and violence especially on women and children are reported and redressed. Furthermore, drop centres and shelter for victims of these abuses have been introduced in some parts on the country. These victims are also counseled and perpetrators of the violence have been punished.

Additionally, the National Gender Policy brought into focus different perspectives and aspects that have perpetuated gender inequality between men and women and proposed ways in which they would be addressed. From that bigger picture, policy designers and implementers came up with strategies that could be used to empower the lower ranked sex. According SADC to (1998: 15), “the gender policy in Zambia was designed in a way that it blended several gender equality matters in response to socio-economic, legal, cultural and psychological obstacles to women and men’s opportunities and self-development due to differences in life experiences.” It resulted into proposals from various sectors of society on how inequality between men and women could be eliminated. Global and regional policies that were meant to empower women and promote gender equality were adopted. Such clauses became part of the national objectives and goals within specified periods. For example, the United Nations’ theme for 30 percent women presentation in decision making positions, which became part of the national targets of development. This resulted into improvements in terms of holding decision making positions by women like in Parliament, Cabinet, ministerial levels, media houses and other sectors of the Zambian society.

WEAKNESSES OF THE GENDER EQUALITY MEASURES
However, despite the positive contributions that the National Gender Policy has made towards the realisation of gender equality, there is a lot that has to be done to address the existing gender disparities in different avenues of life, be it economic, social, and political or decision making positions. For example, measures on water and sanitation that the National Water Policy is trying to address have not gone far due to insufficient funding and cultural practices which place the burden of water collection on women without their involvement in decision making. Although the trend is changing due to education, it is still rife in rural areas and homes of least educated couples. These cultural and customary factors have also perpetuated stereotype when it comes to jobs to be given to women. Some employers therefore, expect that women will have lower responsibilities and tend to confine them to particular job ladders. For instance, in the Zambia Army, women cannot rise to certain ranks like a General, as such ranks are considered to be for men.

According to Byrne (1994: 12), “gender imbalances in Zambia have been perpetuated by the factor that women’s legal status is determined by two separate laws: customary and statutory laws, which conflict each other in many ways.” Whereas government is striving to put laws in place that empower women in terms of property ownership or land acquisition, the customary law treats women as dependants, who cannot own personal property. This law states that whatever a woman produces belongs to the husband. Inheritance laws also leave uneducated women destitute to relatives of their husbands (when they die) who may descend on the family property and leave the widow without possessions. Such things have been very common in the country due to high levels of illiteracy among many Zambian women. Worse still, cultural factors are more dominant in the minds of many Zambians than modern approaches to life that try to empower women in various ways. Additionally, the Zambian legislation prohibits women from working underground in the mines, where their menfolk earn a lot of money.

Furthermore, very little has been to address the imbalances that exist in terms access to media coverage as well as holding positions by women in decision making positions in the media. According www.fullstop.com, “the media covered men more than women in 2005 on different programmes like profiling them in newspapers, featuring them on debates like assessing the country’s fighting against corruption, Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), and Vision 2030 among others, with percentage differentials of 88 percent against 12 percent respectively.” Women are often covered in the media mainly when something negative happened to them like rape or battery. Women also hold few influential decision making positions in the media. For example, no woman had ever held the position of the director of the Zambia National Broadcasting Corporation (ZNBC). This trend is common even among private media houses.

CONCLUSION
In the final analysis, it is clear that even though issues of gender mainstreaming have been blend in the country’s National Gender Policy, which has facilitated in addressing gender inequality in national programmes, a lot still has to be done. Taking gender disparities that have characterised the implementation of the national gender policy as a yardstick of the policy’s effectiveness in cushioning the disparities, it is true that most of the policies in it are only good on paper and not in implementation. There are numerous imbalances in many areas of life like education, the media, decision making and employment among others. The media have continued to marginalise women in both coverage and positions. The inequalities have also continued manifesting in land acquisition as well as science and technology issues where women are still the minority. Certain positions have remained “suitable” for men only not women. As a result, poverty has been higher among females than males to the extent that it is taken as feminine phenomenon.






BIBLIOGRAPHY

Byrne B (1994), Gender Profile of Zambia Report No. 29. Briton: University of Sussex.

Chiluba F (2000), National Gender Policy. Lusaka: Cabinet Office.

ECA (2005), Promoting Gender Equity and Women’s Empowerment in Africa: Questioning the Achievements and Confrontation the Challenges Ten Years after Beijing. Addis Ababa: Economic Commission for Africa.

GIDD (2002), Strategic Plan of Action for the National Gender Policy (2004-2008). Lusaka: Gender in Development Division.

Mbula L (2001), Guidelines and Check lists for Mainstreaming Gender in the Public Sector. Lusaka: Cabinet Office.

Nyanga P (2006), Impact of Agricultural Policy Changes on Household Food Security among Small Scale Farmers in Southern Zambia. Oslo: Norwegian University of Life Sciences.

SADC (2003), Report for the Needs Assessment Study for Capacity Building of the National Machineries for Gender Equality in SADC member States: the Case of Zambia. Lusaka: SADC.

Siachiyako G (2006), Women Poverty in Zambia, Incidences and Causes: A Case Study of Small Scale Rural Agricultural Women of Kalomo District in Zambia. Oslo: University of Oslo.

www.fullstop.com: United Nations Economic and Social Council (1997)

youths and school work

INTRODUCTION
Trade is one of the engines of economic growth which in the 19th century propelled the development of the now economically advanced nations. As a stimulant, trade encourages countries to specialise in areas of their comparative advantage in order to increase productivity. It also enables countries to have access to world markets for increased profitability, and access to foreign exchange, and the technology and skills which usually accompany it. However, most of the economic activities that were provoked by trade benefits took place with little care on the environment.

Based on the above concerns, the core thesis of this essay is to discuss how international trade contributes to environmental degradation and to show how multinational corporations (MNCs) have also contributed to the effect using Zambia as a case study.

MAIN BODY
Advantaged with natural resources and favourable climate for agricultural activities, Zambia engaged in international trade at different levels. The country utilised its raw materials like copper, timber and or \ cash crops and others in smaller quantities to penetrate the international market. Under the auspices of arable farming, the growing of tobacco and sugar cane in Choma and Mazabuka respectively became part of income injectors into the domestic economy. Pastoral farming also supplied the market with different animal products, let alone the aspect of value addition for more returns. Many MNCs such as Anglo American Corporation got attracted to Zambia’s comparative advantage in minerals and they invested heavily in the mining sector.

The desire by the MNCs to increase the rate of extracting raw materials from Zambia to meet their high demand by industries in their host countries led to un-precautious exploitation of natural resources at the expense of the environment. Worse still, Zambia embraced most of the investment activities in any nature as a way of alleviating extreme poverty. According to Ellis (2000: 118), “in the 21st century, poverty and environmental degradation are intimately connected, and poverty is seen as a cause and an effect of natural resource depletion in a downward spiral of complicated in-built potential for escalation.” Such negligence in Zambia’s Copperbelt area led increased biodiversity loss, ozone depletion, and the destruction of fauna and flora.

According to Singh (1994: 234), “Zambia accommodated MNCs’ investments in any form as these conglomerates are the key agents of international trade, controlling about 70% of it while investing more than US$40 billion in FI.” And proponents of MNCs investment argued that such FDIs better-off host countries’ economic stature through jobs, tax-base expansion, new technologies, and diverse ancillary businesses like banking or insurance, among others. Additionally, MNCs are considered to offer training and education to employees in R&D, thus creating a higher skilled workforce, and the skills that can be transferred to other areas of the host economy for better management of resources.

Paradoxically, MNCs are merely driven by the profit motive, rather than developing host economies. And LDCs have been the destination of MNCs’ investment because they are: a source of cheap labour and raw materials; have low taxation rates; and have relaxed labour and environmental laws. Due to their financial and political influence, MNCs dominate market possessions, manipulate prices and profits, and or\ generally strict the entry of potential competition by means of their dominating influences over new technologies, special skills and product differentiation, (ibid).

Taking advantage of the weak environmental laws in Zambia, these conglomerates have caused devastating or irreversible environmental problems in the country. People have been displaced to marginal lands, water reserviours have been polluted, soils are eroded, floods have been enhanced, droughts are common due to disturbed rainfall patterns, and some towns like Kabwe are declared the most polluted in the sub-region. Some examples of environmental problems caused by some MNCs activities are given below:

EXAMPLES OF CAUSES OF ENVIROMNEMNTAL DEGRADATION OR PROBLEMS IN ZAMBIA

Mining
Although mining on the Copperbelt has been the mainstay of the Zambian economy for years, it has complex environmental impacts which include water pollution, air pollution and dust, siltation and sedimentation. Geographically, it has led to landscape disfigurement and displacement of existing land users particularly in agriculture and human settlements. A clear example of this is the land degradation in Chingola due to open pit mining. According to CSO Report (2004: 87), “all the mining companies cause environmental damage of one form or the other, for instance KCM admitted that it is facing environmental challenges due to the cumulative effect of mining and smelting for over 70 years.” The report indicates that KCM mining activities have primarily impacted on water by discharging high suspended solids into the Kafue river” (ibid).

Apart from the problem of siltation and sedimentation in the Kafue river, this has also increased costs of water supply and sanitation as supplying companies spend huge amounts of money on water treatment to control the turbidity and be able to supply clear and palatable water that conforms to the WHO specifications. According to the NWASCO (2006: 34), “the water on the Copperbelt is not conducive for human consumption due to high levels of affluent into the Kafue river by the mining and other industries, which have also disturbed the growth of vegetation.” Mining companies, for example KCM has failed to meet the ECZ statutory standards regarding sulphur dioxide pollution from its Smeltaco plant in Kitwe. ECZ recommended the use of converter modified technology, which enables the capture of more sulphur dioxide that can in turn be used to manufacture sulphuric acid for mineral processing. This is in line with the environmental concept of cleaner production, which promotes the continuous use of industrial processes and products in order to reduce pollution and thus minimise the risks to humans and the environment.

Secondly, Spirit of the River Company Ltd in Western Province is the recent example of a profit driven company which exposed the aquatic life in the Zambezi river to danger. According to Chakwe (2006:03), “the company polluted the water in the river by using a poisonous chemical to kill a large number of fish for the extraction of diamond and other precious minerals that they swallow from their bellies.” A lot of fish and other forms of life that live in water died in the river and government have since banned the consumption of the fish from the river.

The third example under mining could be the opening of Abidon Mine in Mazabuka which has seen the displacement of local people from their land to far flung areas. The people were settled on smaller plots of land that may not produce them enough food. The area may have poor water system or poor soil fertility as compared to where they were displaced thus perpetual hunger. According to Mukosa (2007: 01), “the ECZ had rejected the application by the company to set a plant there on the basis that it would be dangerous to human life.” This entails that the company did not meet the EIA standards. The argument by ECZ was that the company’s laboratory was not up to standard in handling the uranium and nickel it was embarking on digging.

Agriculture
In the agriculture sector, much of the land in the country has been acquired and cleared for commercial production. Tobacco farming in Choma in Southern province can be a vivid example. Huge areas of land have been cleared to increase the number of fields to meet the market demand, which is mainly international. Heavy duty machinery like the caterpillar is used in the clearing of the land to quicken the process. The machinery grinds the soil with its metallic wheel system, thus destroying the soil. The net effect of this is soil erosion. To improve the legume’s growth rate and quality, high technology is applied such as the use of hybrid seeds, chemical fertilizers, pesticides and herbicides. Chemicals like fertilizer produce nitrate oxide, which is well known for causing acidification.

Worse still, processing tobacco requires a lot of fire wood. This has led to large scale cutting of trees to supply tobacco growers with the much needed fuel wood. People in the nearby villages are often contracted to supply fire wood to these profit-motivated agro-businesses. This has both disturbed the rain patterns and caused desertification. Specialised humid tropical ecosystems in nutrient recycling are destroyed in the process. Local communities have also lost their farming lands that they depended on for survival. This worsens poverty levels in the country as these communities cannot access basic needs of life. They also fail to take their children to school as the land they are pushed to cannot provide them with enough produce to meet their needs after selling the surplus.

Secondly, the expansion of Nakambala Sugar Estate in Mazabuka has also seen the displacement of local people around the area to the marginal lands. The people have equally lost the farming land. They are also cut off from certain services like education and medical due to long distances. Additionally, there was no EIA which was done to approve the project. The chemicals used to enhance the plants’ growth rate have serious environmental impacts. Further more, the expansion will add on the emission of smoke to the air from the production plant, hence more carbon monoxide (CO) in the air. The combination of CO and nitrate oxide (from the chemical fertilizers used to plant) forms smog. The net effects of this are eye problems, risks of asthma and poor distribution of oxygen in the red blood cells.

Farmers are also requested to rent out their fields to the company for increased sugar cane growing. The net effect of this will be perpetual hunger in the area as the peasants spend more of their time growing the cane sugars at the expense food production. Government will be then forced to ask for food assistance in times of poor harvests to off-set the shortfall. Food aid, especially genetically modified foods (GMOs) which are unfriendly to the environment due to the chemicals used in their growth may come in the country. The GMOs often disturb the pollination system of local crops due to the chemicals applied to them when preserving them.

Timber processing
The large-scale forest clearance for timber production for export for example in areas like Mwekela or Dora Hill in Copperbelt has led to the destabilization of the humid tropical ecosystems that are specialised in nutrient recycling. The destruction of these forests therefore results in loss of the important biodiversity and disturbs stable ecological cycles. According to Lungu and Silengo (1997: 56), “the indiscriminate logging also leads to deforestation, which further leads to siltation of reserviours, damaging to hydro-electric plants, increase in floods, which consequently damage property, crops and animals.” And that coupled with mining emissions has worsened the environmental destruction in the area to the extent that vegetables and other greens do not grow to normal texture and taste in most towns in Copperbelt.

These conglomerates however do not contribute much to the Zambian economy in terms of revenue as they enter into logging concessions. And during the signing of these concessions, there are either no clauses of law on the protection of the forestry or MNCs disobey them deliberately. When these laws are abrogated, they often use corrupt officials to escape it.


Conclusion
Although free international trade is said to have a crucial role in national development, its domain greatly contradicts that of the environment. This is because most practices of free global trade tend to be incompatible with environmental conservation. In many instances, this trade has been built on unacceptable levels of resource exploitation, which destroys the environment often with no regard to future generations. This has mainly exerted greater threat to the health and well being of the environment in LDCs, whose major foreign exchange source is the export of raw materials like timber, minerals, fish and cash crops. The timber trade demonstrates the pit-falls of natural resource-based exports as it is among the factors underlying deforestation in many LDCs. This is because the need for foreign exchange encourages LDCs to cut timber faster than forests can be regenerated. And the over-cutting has both caused the depletion of the resources that underpins the timber trade and loss of forest based livelihoods, soil erosion and down-stream flooding.

youths and the constitution

NATIONAL CONSTITUTION CONFERENCE: WHY THE NOISE?
The constitution making process in Zambia has become rather messy and characterised by acrimony. Not that acrimony per se is bad, but it may be a healthy sign if it is both an affirmation and expression of a mature society that accommodates divergence and diversity of views.
Unfortunately, in today’s Zambia with exceedingly low levels of tolerance and accommodation, continued acrimony characterized by high handed attitudes, precipitate and confrontational behavior, incessant bickering over issues of such profound concern of our country could lead to polarization, which may be the best prescription for social disorder and wasteful mechanisms that have led to the condemnation of many African countries as agents of perpetual regression and consequential poverty.
The constitution of a country is per force the fundamental law of a country. It cannot be neutral on forms of governance and other issues auxiliary and incidental there to including the direction of socio-economic development and social equity. All citizens are stakeholders in any desired constitutional process and a meaningful and sustainable constitution at the end of the day is only accomplished if it is a product of consensus by an unquestionably broad spectrum of society.
In tracing the process of writing a constitution and the consequent noise in the under taking, it is important to give a brief background of the much controversial constitutional process.
According to the interim report of the constitution review commission dated 20th June 2007, the Republican President Dr. Levy Patrick Mwanawasa appointed the Constitutional Review Commission on 17th April 2003. This was two years after the coming into office of President Mwanawasa¢s regime and eight years after the enactment under controversial circumstances of the 1996 Mwanakatwe constitution. Many people however, had expected the president to push through the constitution much earlier in his term instead of waiting for two years to do so, because constitutional review was the most prioritized issue the public expected, given the controversy surrounding the Chiluba exercise on the same, as Alexander Chikwanda puts it ‘before the 2006 parliamentary and Presidential elections, there was an outcry for expedition in ordaining a new constitution So that the presidential election results would have reflected a 50 percent plus one to ensure the president was given an indisputable electoral mandate’.
By statutory instrument number 40 of 2003 cap 41, the President appointed the commission headed by Mr. Willa. D. Mungomba. It will be recalled that this was the fourth commission to have been appointed to review the country’s constitution since independence in 1964 which alone suggests that previous exercises had simply not been successful according to Professor Michelo Hansungule.
'Government granted the commission a whooping 31 terms of reference literary asking it to look at every aspect that previously deferred solution in effective constitution making.’ Among the important terms of reference stated by government include: a recommendation of a system of government that will promote democratic governance and against the emergence of a dictatorial form of government and to suitable methods of amending and adopting the constitution.
The commission duly discharged its functions, which it was instituted to carry out. It must be noted that petitioners where called upon to address themselves on the mode adoption were some recommendations suggested that the process be adopted by the president, house of chiefs, and by the commission itself. However the two most preferred modes were adoption by the constituent assembly and by the national assembly. The latter however, is the current mode the country has used since independence.
Of the two most preferred methods, the commission after a marathon review of previous Mvunga and Mwanakatwe review processes in which petitioners similarly recommended adoption by the constituent assembly decided to settle for the latter against adoption by the national assembly. Convincing reasons however were advanced by this decision including previous mistrust over the use of the current mode of adoption in which the government abused its inherent power to prejudge the outcome of the review process and reject some of the recommendations made substituting them for its own.
However, despite the CRC having recommended that a constituent assembly, or any popular body that would represent the views of the people adopt the new constitution, government however went ahead to settle for the mode of adoption by the NCC. This came to light through the Chief government spokesperson, Mike Mulongoti who announced on July the 15, 2007 that government was departing from what the majority of people agreed to on the constitution making process and apparently the noise was initiated.
The noise in the process of writing the constitution as stated by the Times of Zambia News Paper dated 27th July, 2007, could further be stated that it started when president Levy Mwanawasa gave his assert to the National Constitutional Conference (NCC) Act early in September 2007. A number of stakeholders have however, rejected the NCC act, saying it cannot deliver a people driven constitution that could stand the test of time.
The Catholic Church is among the stakeholders that have rejected the NCC act. According to the President of Zambia Episcopal conference Fr. Telephore Mpundu, the church would only sit in the NCC if the Act were revised.
The church also rejected calls by Government that those who are aggrieved should take their grievances to the conference, however, fears are that when the sittings begin the NCC act will not be on the menu at the conference, alleging that by the time the deliberations start the members of the NCC will have made a solemn oath to abide by the act. It is however, not logical to consider the act later but the time to re-look at the act is now rather than later Mpundu said.
However, the bishops have raised five objections to the act, first they alledged that the law departs from the clear recommendation by the people that a new constitution be written. It suggests that it will be up to the conference to determine the need for a new constitution.
Secondly, there is Noise as the bishops argue that the expected 502 delegates, of the conference 337 are politicians and government related participants. It is also argued that many other stakeholders will be shut from the deliberations and the mere fact that the law provides for wide classes of participants without specifying how they will be chosen is an issue to consider in the transparency of the process.
The third objection the bishops have put forth is that the act gives sweeping powers to the conference that, in the light of the same skewed composition, the delegates can undo the demands and wishes of the people for over 20 years of a need for a totally new constitution.
The fourth decision the bishops have put fourth in their reject of the act is that the church has expressed fears that the role of parliament as provided for in the NCC act, could lead to mere amendment to the current constitution, instead of writing a new one. It is argued that the NCC brings back parliament to play a role even before the referendum. The question raised is that ‘will parliament deliver this, given the number of times it has failed the people’?

Finally, the church argues that the act gives the president a blank cheque to dissolve the conference if he/she deems it necessary, or extend its life span for as long as he/she wishes.
The church however, express a concern that if these issues are thoroughly dealt with, they shall be willing to attend and participate fully in the conference. If however, this fails then the church reserves the right to stay away from the conference, as they do not want to give legitimacy to a process that lacks proper consensus. The church is not the only institution that has contested to the Act; various political parties and other associations have alleged that the act cannot represent the views of the people.
It is clear that the CRC recommended that a constituent assembly or any popular body that would represent the views of the people adopt the new constitution. It can be assumed in this matter that the people of Zambia through the CRC want a totally new constitution and not amendments to the current constitution and this should be through a body which would represent their views or at least be seen to be representing the people’s views.
Patriotic front (PF) secretary General, Edward K. Mumbi has said that the position of the PF is that the NCC in its current form and composition cannot and will not represent the views of the people. The party alleges that the act has not taken on board the key recommendations of the stake holders through the parliamentary committee on legal affairs, governance, human rights and gender on the national constitutional conference bill (No 26 of 2007). For instance, where as the committee recommended that there should be proportional representation of the conference by having the number of members representing political parties equal to the number of representatives from church mother bodies, the act provides for only three (3) from each church mother body and provides for six (6) from each political party. This brings nominees of political parties in the act to a total of (48) while the church mother bodies have only a paltry twelve (12).
The committee also recommended a reduction of representatives from each security wing from three (3) to one but the amended Act came up with only two (2).
The other contentious issue raised by stakeholders is that despite the committee having recommended a reduction in the number of civil servants to four the number of those civil servants participating has been maintained hence adding flesh to the fears held by a number of stake holders.
The committee went further to suggest that for any church mother body to be qualified to send three (3) representatives pursuant to section 4 (1)(C) it should have been in existence for at least ten (10 years) at the appointment, surprisingly, the Act ignored all this and is now providing for five years of existence only.
Section (7) of the act is clear in that, whoever has numerical superiority in the NCC will carry the day. All decisions of the NCC will be by consensus, adding that all issues will be resolved by secret ballot.
However, as if the above inadequacies are not enough in the act, there is a situation where nominations have been given to non-existing institutions and unnamed organizations. For instance, section 4 (1) (5) stipulate that:
The NCC must comprise one eminent Zambian, from each province who has distinguished oneself in any business field or profession.
Section 4 (1) (j) also provides:
That the NCC must comprise of three (3) representations of women’s organizations that are not members of the non-governmental organizations coordinating council (NGOCC).
Section 4 (1) (z) provides:
Ten (10) representatives of non-governmental organizations registered under the societies act or any other written law.
It is however interesting to note subsections 2 of section 4 provides that: their representative institutions shall nominate the representatives referred to in section 4(1). The question at this point is, which institution will nominate members to the NCC under the above sub section in section 4 considering that there are no known institution in existence at the moment which cater for section 4 (1) (5), (V) and (z) categories nor is there a description of the process by which those at section 4 (1) (5), (V) and (z) shall be identified and nominated.
Patriotic front (PF) president Michael Sata further alleges that the other contentious issue however, is that the powers given to the president under the act in a well analyzed view can be a danger to the process itself as the incumbent can use these powers arbitrary to abort the process if in his sole judgment he believes the process is not going the way he wants.
Government on the other hand, despite the above allegations alleges that the NCC is significant in that it is the first of its kind since independence was attained. This view though can be supported due to the fact that three constitutions have been passed by parliament before but a popular body of the people’s representatives adopted none of those. It is stated that passed constitution recommendations were submitted to the government of the day that decided what to implement and what to leave out. For the first time in Zambia’s history the recommendations of a review commission will be debated and adopted by a body comprising politicians’, traditional leaders, leaders of professional bodies and trade unions, women and youths.
It is interesting to note that not all the civil society organizations have shunned participation in the NCC, one such body is to ZCTU which has confirmed its participation and pledged to advocate for workers rights at the conference, but one may be interested to know which rights will be advocated for, are they the same rights of the civil servants that were rejected in the act or is the ZCTU just going to represent its self interest?.
Lawyers have not be left out in his whole controversy, a pronounced constitutional lawyers is for the view that the NCC is a Golden opportunity for the country to put in a constitution that is legitimate and popular. Mr. John sangwa has however, urged all citizens to participate in order to ensure that a popular and legitimate constitution is put in place that will stand the taste of time.
However, it is important to note that some people who speak for the government quite often more with unconstrained zeal than sense have entertained the country to monologues. These individuals, some, palpably intelligent have their credibility seriously dented by addressing obvious galleries and by giving the impression that they hold the public offices because of their sycophantic propensities and not their cerebral functions and performance.
However, if government intentions are good and its acts appropriately, the national constitutional conference can offer a solution provided government brings on board those political parties and organizations (especially the church) that have expressed genuine reservations not necessarily about the NCC but the way everybody would have be encouraged into submission. The constitution as stated earlier is something in which everyone has a vested interest. Therefore it is important in this instance that all Zambians feel they own the process for this is the only way to pre-empt possible future strife and spare the country the agony and anguish of conflict and civil strife.
Consequently, consensus will be essential in arising at an agreement on the final draft constitution. As a result the only way to give our beloved motherland a constitution to stand the test of time is by entrenching consensus and not circumventing it by some verbal acrobatics and semantic kites. Of course, it is possible that a constitution can be put together by the mode of adoption suggested by the CRC.
As Michael Sata puts it ‘a constitution shrouded in acrimony and bitterness by any sections of our community will be a poisoned chalice and a gross disservice to posterity.’ Therefore in order to bring about oneness in the process, the president’s constituency goes for beyond the zealous MMD cadres, he must embrace all the Zambians and everyone has an inescapable moral responsibility and civic duty not only to support him but also to admonish him with unfilled condor to ensure progress.
Finally in order to ensure transparency and consequently progress in the constitutional making process government must bend back wards if there should be a compelling need to do so to accommodate the church and other stakeholders. It is inappropriate and in expedient for the government to trade obscenities with the church, as chikwanda puts it the church has always been the country’s staunchest and remorseless ally in development endeavours.
The government must recognize that the bishops do not have a private agenda nor are they partisan. It must be noted that when the church speaks on an issues, it is because in their daily interaction within society they see the devastating poverty of the people and widening gap between the few privileged and the majority that are lacking.
It is hoped that every stakeholder in the acrimony over the constitution making process can spare a consideration for the less privileged in society as all their dreams of a prosperous and peaceful Zambia are in their hands. Zambia, as the President (Dr. Mwanawasa) has hinted is bigger than all our individual and collective egos. The overriding interests of posterity should always enjoy unquestioned and unmitigated significance over our petty interests.

EPAs and youths: what do others say?

JUBILEE Zambia Monze chapter has called for the postponement of the signing of the Economic Partnership Agreements (EPA) scheduled for December 2007 in order to allow for full consultations among the people. And former commerce minister Dipak Patel has challenged the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries including Zambia to question the merits and demerits of the EPA. During a stakeholders meeting on economic literacy held in Monze recently, Jubilee Zambia observed that EPAs will result in reduction and loss of revenue and sovereignty. “We feel that in their current form if signed, the EPAs will lead to reduction and loss of revenue and sovereignty by the government resulting in job losses and will strangle the country’s right to pursue a home grown development agenda. We therefore recommend that signing of the EPAs due in December 2007 be postponed indefinitely to allow for more time for dialogue, consultations and negotiations,’ it stated. Jubilee Zambia stated that there was need for coherence and consistency in the positions Africa adopts in all areas of relations and negotiations with the European Union (EU). “It is increasingly clear that there is inadequate knowledge of the EPA negotiations within the various Regional Economic Communities (RECs), leading to a lack of information to the public about an agreement that has repercussions on their livelihood. So it is important that the issues are not left simply to the cynical manipulations of the EU on one hand and to the deception of ACP regions on the other,” stated Jubilee Zambia. Some of the partner organisations that attended the meeting include farmer associations, marketeers, faith based Organisations, political representatives, pensioners and trade unions. They also called on the government to urgently attend to key areas of concern. And speaking recently, Patel observed that European countries should stop preaching about free trade when their agriculture subsidies were killing the potential of the agriculture sector on the African continent. “So before preaching to Africans about virtues of EPAs and free trade, let the rich countries first think about what their subsidies do to Africa and stop forthwith their unbridled liberalisation demands they make on Africa and other least developed countries (LDCs),” he said. Patel said that EU members, such as Italy, France, Ireland and Spain among many others are steadfast in ensuring that they not only ‘protect’ their farmers from opening up their markets, but also ensure that they continue with subsidies in one form or another.
'Nothing is agreed till everything is agreed!' that's the name of the game, says Zambian Trade, Policy Expert Dipak Patel. Patel was speaking at an EPA National Conference organised by PELUM, KEPA Zambia, JCTR, CSTNZ and CUTS at the Mulungushi International Conference Centre. Patel who is also former Zambian Minister of Commerce, Trade and Industry said that African countries are still negotiating Singapore issues (government procurement, at the World Trade Organization (WTO), which is the overall body in the trade issues and wondered why a sudden shift to include the Singapore issues (Investment, government procurement, competition and trade facilitation) in the Economic Partnerships Agreements (EPAs). “African economies are still growing and signing an EPA that includes Singapore issues would mean being "stupid". African countries must not rush into signing these agreements, which will bind them for 15 to 25 years Zambia for example, has made grave mistakes economically during the privatization exercise which she is still recovering from even now. There is no way Zambian companies can compete with Europeans companies in government procurement, it will be dull to think like that" Patel said. Patel said that in the 15 years of him working as trade negotiator for the Zambian government, he has seen how other negotiators from other counties are bull dozed into committing their governments and never say anything in the these meetings of agreements. He mentioned that the trade economic cooperation dimension of CPA under Article 36.1 requires that ACP countries and the EC negotiate World Trade Organization compatible trade regime which should involve the progressive liberalization of trade between the two blocks of countries. Earlier, Director of Foreign Trade in the Ministry of Commerce, Trade and Industry Dorothy Tembo said Zambia is faced with challenges of ineffective engagement with the stakeholders due to limited technical capacity constraints to further clarify Zambian's position. Tembo also noted that the other challenge was the conflicting demands of various regional and multilateral commitments such as SADC, COMESA and WTO. "The deadline for signing WTO compatible EPAs is December 31, 2007 and the option of an alternative to an EPA has not been explored. The review has highlighted delays in the negotiation process, capacity constraints, limited human and resource capacity on the ESA side as stumbling blocks in the negotiations. “Zambia as an LDC can fall back on the Everything but Arms (EBA), but EBA is unilateral and not contractual so it can be withdrawn at any time. EBA also has its own shortcomings and does identify alternatives to EPA. Zambia will need to take this into account and cooperate with other ESA countries not in a position to sign an EPA” Said Mrs. Tembo. Participatory Ecological Land Use Management (PELUM) Regional desk, Campaigns, Advocacy and Lobbying Officer Anne Maina said that despite the theoretical benefits of EPAs as seen by the EC like increased intra-regional trade and funding to support regional integration, challenges facing ESA are grave. Maina went to highlight the supply side constraints which include poor infrastructure, inaccessible roads, high costs of inputs and inaccessibility to credit facilities. “It is difficult to see how EPAs will facilitate Africa's intra-regional trade when EU products are likely to displace regional production and intra-regional trade, especially in higher value-added sectors and also the types of Rules of Origin (ROO) that the EU adopts in relation to ACP imports will affect the ACP countries' ability to undertake trans-border regional production,” she said Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) are not necessarily bad if trade liberalization is done over a long period of time and if it protects key products, which contribute to livelihood, food security and rural development. However, FTAs can be bad and dangerous when they are between unequal parties like the EU and ESA countries. Subsidies given to EU farmers cause unfair competition as EU products are dumped into ESA countries which will force farmers to abandon production due to unfair competition and this can be a threat to food security. Maina said if EPAs are signed it will lead to small scale farmers losing their livelihoods when faced with increased competition from Europe's highly subsidized products and EPAs will lead to a loss of government revenues from imports and we shall have to carry the burden of adjustment costs as welfare and social services are dropped because of dwindling government revenue. European Commission delegation Francesca Di Mauro said, no ACP country has formally asked for an alternative to EPA. Di Mauro stated that the extension of waiver will be costly and the best option would be to strive to conclude before December 31, 2007.

whose interest is Sata serving: Taiwani or Young zambians?

Chinese Investment in Africa and Implications for International Relations, Consolidation of Democracy and Respect for Human Rights: The Case of Zambia







By




Michael Chilufya Sata
President
Patriotic Front, Zambia

















Paper presented to the Harvard University Committee on Human Rights Studies Events Series, October 24, 2007, Harvard University, Cambridge, Boston, MA
Chinese Investment in Africa and Implications for International Relations, Consolidation of Democracy and Respect for Human Rights: The Case of Zambia


1.0 Introduction
Recent involvement of the People’s Republic of China in the exploitation of Africa’s natural resources has attracted worldwide attention and concern, especially to people within and outside the African continent interested in the social and economic advancement of the poorest continent on earth. The concern, debates and speculation are not without foundation, because with a population of 1.3 billion, China is the most populous nation in the world. It is also the largest country in the world in terms of physical size. The enormous human resource and physical size, cannot, however, generate adequate capital for quality investments at home and abroad. It is, therefore, not surprising that China has found it difficult to generate adequate capital since the end of its 1947-49 Civil War.

China’s recent march into Africa is by and large a search for natural resources, and especially oil, timber and base metals to guarantee survival for its people. This is critical to coerced internal stability and unity, as well as to ensuring that China remains a global power. As an investor in Africa, China is said to be the continent’s third largest investor, after the United States and France. This newly found economic power has enhanced China’s influence on the continent, and has a bearing on the conduct of international relations, especially in the 46 African countries that have diplomatic ties with China.

The increased clout of the People’s Republic of China in Africa has a bearing on consolidation of democracy and a culture of respect for human rights, because China does not subscribe to democracy and is inconsistent in upholding human rights at home. China also tends to ignore human rights abuses in developing countries in general, and in countries with which it has closer diplomatic ties in particular. The excuse for ignoring human rights abuses in other countries is China’s policy of “non interference” in the internal affairs of other countries, which basically amounts to appeasement of individual leaders of the countries concerned.

China’s increased clout in Africa has emerged at a time when the continent’s democratic evolution is at cross roads. Most African countries embraced democracy and open market economies only in the 1990s, after the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe and end of the cold war. Progress towards consolidation of democracy and respect for human rights has been poor in most African countries, due to the narrow depth of internal democratic forces, and high levels of poverty. Most of the democratic concessions obtained in Africa in the 1990s were in fact obtained with the help of western governments, which relied on conditional economic support. Many African countries have, nevertheless, been trying to leave behind their brutal past of dictatorship, economic chaos and decline. Among the principle objectives of the African Union, for example, are promotion of democracy, good governance and respect for human rights. Under these circumstances, what are the implications of Chinese economic presence in Africa for international relations, consolidation of democracy, and respect for human rights? To address, these questions, we ought to examine Chinese policies towards Africa and its interaction with that continent. We should also bear in mind that poverty in Africa is pervasive, and has hardly spared any one, including the political leaders. The Chinese are aware of this, and are preying on the poverty of many African political leaders.

Background to Zambia
Zambia was called Northern Rhodesia when it was a British colony. It was granted independence on 24thOctober, 1964. After 8 years of multi-party democratic rule, the country descended into a One Party Socialist State, and changed for the worse, from one of the most promising middle-income African countries in the early 1970s, to one of the poorest in the world by the late 1980s. The country reverted to a free market economy and multi-party political system in 1991, after the wind of change that swept away the dictatorial regimes of Eastern Europe. Like many other African countries, however, Zambia has found it difficult to consolidate democracy, the rule of law and respect for human rights. In consequence, Zambia has also found it difficult to attract genuine investors and has become the prey of the rogue Chinese investors that have no regard for the welfare of those that are unfortunate enough to work for them, let alone the countries that have allowed them to exploit their natural resources and people.
Chinese Involvement in Africa
China declared support for some African liberation movements in 1965 in a bid to break its isolation orchestrated by the USA and the Soviet Union. Declaration of open support for the African liberation movements earned China recognition among some African countries. Many countries were, however, wary of China’s intentions, especially in the light of its governance of its so-called autonomous regions, such as Tibet, which are predominantly occupied by ethnic minorities, as well as its attitude towards the Republic of China (Taiwan). Rapprochement between the US and China in the early 1970s, however, resulted in China’s admission to the United Nations at the expense of Taiwan. This helped improve China’s image and enabled her to establish diplomatic relations with most African countries.

The Sino-African diplomatic relations are based on the so-called “one China policy”, which basically requires non-recognition and isolation of Taiwan. Most African countries that have established diplomatic relations with China have done so without adequate information about Taiwan. This is because China has employed cold war tactics of keeping them ignorant about Taiwan, while China trades and welcomes Taiwanese investment. Taiwan is, for example, China’s biggest trading partner, while Taiwan invested as much as US$6 billion in China in 2005 alone. Most diplomatic ties between China and many African countries have, therefore, been forged in ignorance on the part of the African countries. The one China policy, on the other hand, lacks diplomatic etiquette, as it does not reflect equality and mutual respect between China and Africa.

Sino-Zambia Relations
Diplomatic relations between China and Zambia were forged in the run up to Zambia’ independence, but were deepened by the western countries’ partial handling of the Unilateral Declaration of Independence (UDI) by the Smith regime in Rhodesia, on account of racial and blood ties. It was, however, the western countries’ refusal to help construct the Tanzania-Zambia Railway on account of protecting the interests of the white colonial settler regimes in Southern Africa that delivered Zambia into China’s sphere of influence. China took advantage and offered Zambia and Tanzania an interest free loan of One Hundred and Sixty Six (£166) Million British Pounds and undertook to construct the railway line. She also undertook to pick up any additional costs, should the actual cost exceed the estimated cost of the railway line. China also offered consumer goods to the two countries to help them raise funds to meet the local construction costs.

Construction of the Tanzania-Zambia railway begun in 1970 and was completed in 1975. Completion of the new railway line, however, coincided with an economic melt down in both Tanzania and Zambia. The economic melt down was due to rising oil prices against declining commodity prices; and poor economic management, as both countries had undertaken massive nationalization of large and medium size firms in their economies. Short- term economic stabilization programs provided by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) failed to halt the economic stagnation. Economic decline and decay thus set in. The economic deterioration in both countries was, in fact, so deep that, by 1982, the IMF advised a return to market economies in the two countries.

Zambia undertook the economic reforms without strong political will, which resulted in an “on and off” approach to the reforms. This approach delayed the economic turn around and damaged the economy further. The Government of Zambia courted China during the economic crisis, because it was considered an ideological ally. China, however, could not give any help. The economic crisis degenerated into a political crisis when the trade union movement and other social groups that had been cowed into silence, challenged the legitimacy of the one party state after the fall of the communist regimes in Eastern Europe. Partial reform of the political system led to a return to a multi-party political system in 1991.

The first multi-party elections in 17 years were held in October 1991. They were won by the political movement, which advocated a multi-party political system and a free market economy. The new Government carried through most of the economic reforms within its first five years, but failed to build on the democratic gains of 1991. On the foreign policy front, the main change was the establishment and re-establishment of diplomatic relations with South Korea and Israel respectively. Zambia’s diplomatic relations with China and other countries thus remained intact, while trade between Zambia and China like before remained low too.

Development cooperation between Zambia and China during Zambia’s economic crisis was confined to education and culture, health and defense. China never got involved in any significant efforts aimed at reviving the Zambian economy after the construction of the Tanzania-Zambia Railway. The Zambian Government did, however, contract China to construct two trunk roads, and invested in a textile plant in partnership with China. The latter was a feeble and belated attempt to diversify Zambia’s economy in the late 1980s. Issues of economic reform were, therefore, left entirely to the Government of Zambia and the international financial institutions (the IMF and the World Bank), as well as the western bilateral development agencies. Even when Zambia’s heavy foreign debt burden got out of hand at US$7 billion, China did not step in with any help. It was only after the international financial institutions and the western bilateral donors had come up with the Multi-lateral Debt Relief Initiative (MDRI) and the Highly Indebted Poor Countries Initiative (HIPC) that Zambia’s debts even to China could be forgiven.

In times when Zambia had policy disagreements with the international financial and western bilateral development agencies, however, and especially on governance and human rights issues, China stood out by providing dubious loans and grants mostly for consumption, and the impoverished defense and security services. China’s dubious assistance to Zambia enabled the Government to arrogantly stand its ground on serious governance and human rights issues. Chinese assistance, in particular, helped postpone Zambia’s constitution making to some other time in the future. Ten years down the line, Zambia is still tying to enact a new constitution that could meet the aspirations of its people, uphold human rights, and stand the test of time.

Chinese Investments in Zambia
Chinese direct investment in Zambia begun when the Government started to dispose of the firms it had previously nationalized. The Chinese acquired Chambishi Copper Mine and the Sinazeze Coal Mine. Due to corruption, the Chinese were given favorable terms, including generous tax exemptions for 15 years and even permission to export unprocessed ores to China. The tax exemptions had to be extended to the other mining companies that had acquired the other Copper mines, such as Glencore, First Quantum Minerals and Vendata Resources. Although the tax exemptions should have been reviewed in 2005, the Government grew cold feet, because of its close ties with the Chinese. As a result, the country and its people have not benefited from the recent high copper prices. The losses to the people of Zambia have been made worse by Government’s agreement to relieve the mining companies of responsibility for social services in the mining townships. As a result, most of the money from the exports of minerals is accruing to the mining companies, which tend to take out most of the money. Thus, Zambia has little to show for the high copper prices obtained over the last few years.

The amount of money China has invested in Zambia is often exaggerated, because it has mostly invested in already established mines. The only green investment was in an explosives factory, which was set-up for the sole purpose of supplying explosives to the two mines acquired by China. However, China has also promised to invest in the so-called Zambia-China Economic and Trade Cooperation Zone and to construct a sports stadium on the Copperbelt. The Chinese investment in the two mines has been accompanied by medium and small-scale Chinese private investments, including traditional healers. The private Chinese investments have also been established with the assistance of the Chinese Government.

Chinese investments in Zambia have raised controversy on a number of counts. The large scale-mining and construction firms have created industrial disharmony, because of providing poor working conditions, which do not comply with the labour laws, environmental regulations and the occupational health and safety standards. They also pay “slave wages”. The Chinese investments have also created only a limited number of skilled and unskilled jobs for Zambians, because most technical and managerial positions, as well as a significant number of unskilled jobs are reserved for, and held by the Chinese workers, who have come along with the investment. The situation is worsened by disparities in wages paid to the Chinese and Zambian workers doing the same jobs, with the Chinese being paid substantially more. Similarly, the issuance of work permits in Zambia is now marred by discrimination, because whereas the Chinese firms can take into Zambia any number of Chinese workers they wish to take in, whether skilled or unskilled, the non-Chinese employers find it very difficult to obtain work permits even for very few skilled workers from other countries. Due to the favorable treatment given to the Chinese by the Immigration service, there are currently more than 80 000 Chinese nationals in Zambia.

Exclusion of Zambians from technical and managerial jobs denies qualified people employment opportunities in their own country, while the unskilled Chinese workers have taken away employment from their unskilled Zambian counterparts. Many Zambians cannot understand why unskilled workers from China should take away employment opportunities from their Zambian counterparts, in the face of very high unemployment levels, estimated at more than 70%. The Chinese investment in Zambia is therefore more beneficial to China than Zambia. The Chinese investment in Zambia also provides China with the natural resources at very low cost and jobs for its surplus labour. The situation is worsened by China’s preference to export copper ores from Zambia to China, which entails transfer of more jobs to China and further reduction of Zambia’s income from its minerals, while at the same time undermining prospects for industrialization and technology transfer to Zambia.

Chinese investors have also been violating the labour laws, environmental regulations, and occupational health and safety standards with impunity, because the Zambian Government shields them from the regulatory bodies. It also ignores very serious reports of abuse of Zambian workers by their Chinese superiors. Failure to observe the occupational health standards at the Chinese government owned explosives factory even resulted in the death of 50 Zambian casual workers, in an explosion that destroyed the entire plant, but in which not a single Chinese life was lost. Many questions surrounding the death of the 50 Zambians workers at the Chinese explosives factory to this day remain unanswered.
Zambia’s failure to curb the violation of industrial and labor laws can be attributed to the overbearing influence of the Chinese Government on its Zambian counterpart, through provision of generous gifts to the ruling Movement for Multi-Party Democracy (MMD) and the powers that be. An editorial comment in an increasingly pro-Government private newspaper, for example, observed that:
“It cannot be denied that some of our investors are treated with kid’s gloves. They are over-protected. And that is why they have the audacity to ignore the laws because they know that, after all, nothing will be done against them.”(The Post, Wednesday 3rd October 2007, p.26)

The situation is, however, unlikely to improve, because the Chinese Government continues to relate to the ruling Movement for Multi-Party Democracy, like it were the only political party in the country, and as if Zambia was still a one party state.

Chinese private investment has also brought into Zambia unfair competition. The Chinese traders, for example, sell cheap low quality products from China ranging from clothes to electronic household goods, which do not meet the local standards for various products. The garments, for example, wear out after being washed once, but they cost substantially less, and uninformed poor people, buy such garments at the expense of stronger locally made garments. Such trading activities are killing the local industry and taking away livelihoods from local people, such as tailors and traders selling better quality garments, not to mention the textile firms, most of which have collapsed not only in Zambia, but in Southern African region as a whole. The entry of Chinese traders in the micro enterprise sector has also worsened competition in an already over-crowded informal economy, which supports the bulk of the labor force.

Chinese investment in Zambia has also brought in Chinese business cartels in which the large-scale Chinese firms only source supplies from the Chinese suppliers. Such restrictive business practices are denying Zambian suppliers not only business opportunities, but livelihoods. The private investors from the People’s Republic of China also have “an unfair advantage” over their competitors in Zambia, because they have access to generous Chinese Government loans and grants provided only to Chinese nationals and enterprises through the Bank of China, which has opened branches in Lusaka and the Copperbelt. Zambians in business of all sizes, on the other hand, have no access to any such generous financial services. Lack of access to finance is in fact the main constraints to the participation of Zambians in the economy of their country. Zambians, therefore seem condemned to exploitation by the emerging Chinese entrepreneurs, who have access to generous Chinese Government loans and exclusive business opportunities from the Chinese enterprises in Zambia.

China’s African Policy
The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs published the China African policy in 2006. It is an update of China’s foreign policy towards Africa in the 21st century and beyond. The China African policy is, however, not futuristic, because it is stooped in the past on issues of democracy, good governance and respect for human rights, as well on “outstanding cold war political conflicts”. The China African policy also seeks to bring China to the same level as the more developed countries in its economic dealings with the African continent. The China African policy is stooped in the past, because it is built on the Chinese Communist Party’s desire to bring all the lands that were once under imperial China under its rule. Little consideration has, for example, been accorded to peaceful co-existence with Taiwan and to the right to self-determination for its people. To avoid a democratic resolution of the Taiwan question, China seeks to retain the “existing global status quo”. Being content with the status quo, however, ignores the profound changes that have taken place and that ought to take place, especially in Africa, for the Africans to step on the ladder of sustainable development.

The China African policy is also not in line with the democratic aspirations of the Africans, because whereas the Africans have recognized absence of democracy and respect for human rights as the major contributing factors to their continent’s lagging behind the rest of the world, China is yet to accept that. For example, while Articles 3 and 4 of the African Union (AU) mandates the African Union to promote democracy, good governance and protection of human rights, as well as to intervene in member states on account of human rights violation, genocide or even to restore order, China still advocates non-interference in the affairs of other countries. As a result, instead of a pledge to cooperate with African countries in the promotion and protection of human rights, China only pledges:
“…to continue to strengthen solidarity and cooperation with African countries …on major international and regional issues and stand for mutual support on major issues concerning state sovereignty; territorial integrity, national dignity and human rights” (Government of the Peoples’ Republic of China, 2006, p.9).

China is not even interested in the governance and human rights records of its partners in Africa and indeed elsewhere. On the basis of the China African policy, it is clear that, China is not interested in advancing democracy, the rule of law and respect for human rights.

Conclusions
The growing influence of China in Africa through its direct investment and provision of loans and grants to governments is a risk to consolidation of democracy and a culture of respect for human rights, because China does not subscribe to these values. China, in particular, perceives human rights as contentious ideological issues between the more advanced countries and the undemocratic regimes in the Third World. China’s attraction to Africa is not an accident, because it is the most populous nation on earth, while Africa is the least densely populated continent. Africa also has enormous natural resources in its soils and forests, which are attractive to a rapidly growing and aggressive China. For the Chinese, therefore, Africa is a mere source of essential natural resources and a potential area of resettlement for its surplus population. The Africans, therefore, ought to engage with China in a more intelligent manner than most are willing to do.

The development of Africa and its people cannot be achieved on the basis of designs and strategies of other people. The Africans ought to take responsibility and protect their heritage and the future of those yet to come. It is, therefore, critical for African countries to review their engagement with China. The foreign policies of African countries should be based on the universal values of democracy, good governance, protection and respect for human rights. A human rights approach to policy formulation in Africa would guarantee human dignity and peace. It is for this reason that, the Patriotic Front in Zambia finds it more prudent to cultivate relations with Taiwan, a democracy and a more advanced country than China, which can provide high quality investment and more equitable trading opportunities.

In comparative terms, Zambia’s experience with Chinese investment is much closer to Africa’s experience during the mercantilist period, which culminated in the enslavement of its people. European colonial exploitation in comparison to Chinese exploitation appear more benign, because even though the commercial exploitation was just as bad, the colonial agents also invested in social and economic infrastructure and services, such as roads, education and health services, particularly through the Christian Missionaries. Investment in education helped nurture the natural yearning for freedom and human dignity, which culminated in the provision of leaders for the African freedom struggles. Chinese investment, on the other hand, is focused on taking out of Africa as much as can be taken out, without any regard to the welfare of the local people. Africa may have barely survived the last 500 years, but it has consistently fought for human dignity. Just as the Africans rejected European exploitation, oppression and dehumanization, there is no doubt that Chinese exploitation and domination will be rejected too.