Staff Development at ZIGS

As part of our commitment to our agricultural and environmental studies programme every teacher and member of staff at ZIGS will undergo a training programme within their first few weeks at ZIGS to ensure that this aspect of our work is central to our school. We have already established links with the Kasisi Agriculture College, near to Lusaka, and they have promised to train our staff in order to make them au fait with the principles of organic farming, permaculture agriculture and sustainable development. I was privileged to spend a day at the Kasisi Agricultural College and the work they do is awe inspiring. The prospect of working with them is exciting in itself!

Zambian Elections 2008

Rupiah Banda (MMD) is the new President of Zambia. He's won the election by the narrowest of margins defeating Michael Sata by about 1% of the vote. Sata and his Patriotic Front party are now crying foul and claiming that the election has been stolen from them. Unfortunately The Post newspaper, once a bastion of impartiality, is adding fuel to what might turn out to be a nasty fire. Sata said before the election that he would only accept the outcome if he won! The danger is that he now tries to mobilise the popular support he has in the urban areas and causes civil disobedience. Zambia is a peaceful country with no history of violence and there is great respect for the rule of law. However, Sata is a dangerous populist and should he wish to he can organise and mobilise a dangerous level of support from the most disenfranchised people in Lusaka and across the Copperbelt. He has the support of many of the poorest people in the cities and one can just pray that Sata is moderate in the way in which he calls for action from his supporters.

One would hope that Mr Sata takes a step back and thinks before he opens his mouth. Unfortunately precedent would suggest that this won't be the case. Part of the problem is that Sata led in the early stages of the election process. The first constituencies to be declared after Thursday's election were those in the urban areas - PF strongholds - and thus Sata built a strong lead as results were returned. However, the MMD has great support in rural areas and these results were declared after the urban results. Thus Sata's lead was chipped away constituency by constituency until ultimately Banda overtook him and was declared the winner.

Part of Sata's problem is that in his arrogance he fails to appeal to a cross section of society in Zambia and cannot see that without appealing to voters across all provinces he cannot win the presidency. As in 2006 Sata has lost an election because he could not gain support in the countryside. Rather than face this reality Sata cries foul!

Had Sata been blessed with wisdom he wouldn't have broken off negotiations with Hakainde Hichilema and his UNPD party. HH, as he is fondly known, about a third of the vote - mainly in his stronghold of Southern Province. Evidently had Sata and HH reached an electoral pact then one of them may well have secured the presidency. One can only speculate what happened behind closed doors but one suspects that HH knows that his day may well come whilst Sata, a man in his seventies already, was in his last chance saloon as far as the presidency is concerned. The fact that Hichilema can secure a third of the vote from the third party certainly suggests that he may well become the 'Obama' of Zambian politics.

One hopes that Rupiah Banda will continue the legacy of Levi Mwanawasa. The fact that he was the Vice President and from the same political party bodes well for a level of continuity. Let's hope that his critics, and particularly Sata and the Post newspaper, are willing to work with him to secure a brighter future for all Zambians.

The Post has particularly disappointed me during this election campaign. Their reporting has been subtly partisan and anti Banda. They have persisted in referring to him by his first name, whilst referring to Sata by his surname, which is clearly disrespectful in Zambian society. They have made accusation after accusation against Banda's character on the word of witnesses as reliable as those who testified against Christ. In the interest of unity and peace one hopes that the Post will now give Rupiah Banda a chance to govern. The Post has a history of keeping Zambian politicians 'on their toes' and one hopes that they continue to do so in the interest of the people of Zambia but in a non partizan and unbiased way.

I write as one who subscribes to the Post and has long admired the role the newspaper has played in Zambian democracy but who has grown disheartened with the publication in recent months.

Finally I congratulate Rupiah Banda on his victory and pray for peace and prosperity for all Zambian people.

A recruitment drive at a funeral

A few years ago my wife and I went to a funeral of one of her friends in Lusaka, Zambia. The service was held in a very impressive modern church. Mary, the deceased, had been an active member of the church and the building was packed full of mourners from the church and her family and friends.

The service took the normal sort of pattern. A few hymns, readings from the Bible and some preaching. The preaching was the usual sort of fair I got used to in Pentecostal style churches. The Pastors were charismatic and good orators but thoroughly lacking in any theology to underpin their preaching.

Half way thrrough the service I was sickened by what took place. The leading Pastor (perhaps a self ordained Bishop?) took to the Pulpit and began to preach fire and brimstone type material. He praised the late Mary for choosing Jesus to be her 'personal saviour' and then went on to warn those of us who hadn't done the same thing that we were to be damned unless we repented and proclaimed 'Jesus Christ to be our personal saviour.' To my surprise about a dozen members of the congregation were inspired to rise from their pews and to go to the front of the church to be blessed by the Pastor/Bishop. These people were then taken by one of the other Pastors to 'sign up' for the church. All this took place as the deceased lay before the altar in an open casket. To my mind the whole thing lacked decency and showed little respect for the deceased. However, I'm sure that the dozen new converts would have brought in some extra revenue for what was clearly a fast growing and vibrant business (or do I mean church?)

Zambian children and HIV

Zambia has a population of about 11 million people. More than one million of Zambians are living with HIV. Estimates put the prevelance rate at around 20%. 290 000 Zambians are in need of antiretroviral therapy (ART) and this is the official figure that only takes account of those who know their status. As at March 2006, an estimated 76000 people were on ART in Zambia.

That 76000 Zambians are currently on ARV treatment as of now is not a mean achievement at all one when considers the circumstances. In fact it is quite a phenomenal feat. Especially when we consider that less than three years ago in 2003, during the pilot phase of ART in the Zambian public health sector, there were only 2,000 people on treatment in two centres at Lusaka’s UTH and Ndola Central Hospital. In the second phase in 2004, 10 centres with 15,000 people on treatment. By the end of 2005, it had expanded to over 50,000 people in 62 centres. By now, at the end of August 2006, there are 126 centres and 76,000 people on ART, the vast majority of who are receiving this treatment for free.

(It is sometimes argued that this treatment is not entirely free to the patient as they incur costs in traveling to the clinics to access it. The point is that the patients themselves do no have to pay any of the nearly US $150 per patient per year that it costs to have a person on first line ARVs alone, without even considering the costs of all the laboratory costs that go with the practice of HIV medicine.)

While credit, commendation and praise must be given where they are due because as a country Zambia has made very good progress in this area, we must also acknowledge that Zambia has failed her children. Experts tell us that there are about 85000 children infected with HIV in Zambia, but only less than 3000 of them are on ARV treatment.

HIV/AIDS in rural Zambia

The Zambian health deputy minister Chilufya Kazenene has raised alarm about HIV/AIDS in rural areas reaching alarming levels in the next few years if the current interventions are not scaled up as a matter of urgency.

It will be very sad if some rural areas in Zambia which currently have relatively low prevalence rates of HIV/AIDS start to experience an upward swing in the spread of this virus because very little is being done to ensure that things do not get worse in the rural areas. Zambia has areas like Northern Province with 8.3 per cent infection rate and North-Western Province with 9.2 per cent but very little is being done to help these provinces push down these rates. Obviously areas like Lusaka with 22 per cent infection rates and Copperbelt with 19.9 per cent will definitely require more resources to deal not only with prevention, but also treatment, but this should not mean that the areas with low infection rates should receive negligible attention because soon they will also catch up and it will be a question of closing the stables after the horses have bolted. More work and investment in rural areas can help keep the rates of infection under control.

It is so important that public health officials in Zambia realise that prevention of HIV is of paramount importance. The trouble is that when HIV/AIDS is concerned the culture is often one of 'fire fighting' rather than one of prevention. There is a lot that can be done to reduce or keep under control the prevalence rates in rural areas but not enough is being done. Zambia is spending a disproportionate amount of resources in dealing with the HIV/AIDS problem in urban areas than in rural provinces.

Most rural areas don’t even have testing centres. It is very difficult for our rural dwellers to access ARVs. And for those who have some access to ARVs, they have no proper assistance in how to administer this treatment. They also do not have access to periodic or regular CD-4 counts. Those who have some access to ARVs are not properly helped with administration of these drugs. Some of them are swallowing them like beans, endangering their health. These are very strong drugs that need proper management by competent people; they cannot be taken like aspirin or panadol. The money that various donor organisations have been pouring into the fight against HIV/AIDS does not seem to be reaching the intended people.

Zambia has a myriad of non-governmental organisations that have been created to deal with the HIV problem - a good thing in itself. But most of these organisations (NGOs) really do not benefit the people they are intended to serve. Instead, the greatest beneficiaries are those who run them. Money is spent much more on HIV/AIDS workshops and seminars while even the wisdom that comes from such meetings never reaches the intended beneficiaries, especially those in rural areas.

It is very difficult for rural dwellers living with HIV to fight even the most controllable of opportunistic diseases. Most of the rural clinics or health centres do not have even the minimum facilities to diagnose opportunistic diseases like tuberculosis, let alone the means to treat it. The rural clinics and health centres don’t even have drugs for simple diarrhoea and other health complications that people living with HIV are usually open to. To this is added the problem of hunger. HIV patients, especially those on ARVs, need reasonable access to food. But there are so many people in the rural areas taking HIV drugs on empty stomachs.

We therefore urge those who have made fine use of their resources to help us fight the HIV pandemic in this country to start focusing their attention and money on rural areas. Of course, this shouldn’t be at the exclusion or abandonment of urban areas where the problem has today reached very alarming levels. Doing so will be self-defeating. We are calling on them not to forget the rural areas as they battle with the problem in our urban centres. We should not allow the prevalence levels in our rural areas to ever reach those of the urban centres. If this is allowed to happen, we are likely to see an extinction of the rural populations. Let’s act now on the rural HIV problem - tomorrow may be too late. Let’s scale up our efforts, especially in the rural areas, in fighting this horrible virus.

Mary's Funeral

On the morning of Mary's burial we travelled to Mary's family home in order to assist with providing transport to the church. Several dozen people clung to my bakkie as we made our way through the pothole filled roads of the locations. The funeral party wound its way through the streets until finally we arrived at a modern church a few kilometres away. The church was newly built and was clearly thriving. Mary had been a Pastor at the Church and thus the building was full to beyond a comfortable capacity.

Mary's body lay at the front of the church in front of the altar. Behind the coffin stood an array of Pastors - each of whom would play a part in the service. The most moving part of the service for me was its climax when the congregation filed passed Mary's open casket. Watching her mother and father and especially her son saying goodbye to their daughter/mother has heartwrenching.

After the service we returned to the bakkie and again filled up with people. We then followed the hearse and funeral cars to the cemetry.

The cemetry in Lusaka is the size of a small town. It is vast. The mounds of earth that mark each grave are stretch far beyond the horizon in every direction. In order to accomodate the dead the authorities have had to dig graves in between existing plots and thus the graves are incredibly close together. In fact it is difficult to walk through the graveyard without stepping on the side of some of the mounds.

The driver of the hearse struggled to find the plot where Mary was to be buried. We drove in a snake-like convoy through the cemetry for a worryingly long period of time before the plot was found. In other circumstances the scene might have been almost comical. It goes to illustrate just how vast the cemetries are in Southern Africa.

Mourning for Mary

After learning of Mary's death we travelled to the home of her parents to pay our respects to the family. The family house was in one of the locations not far off the Great East Road. It was a very simple house and the family were obviously quite poor. In fact Mary was the only child of her parents who had been working. Her parents and her siblings had all been completely and utterly depenant on Mary for everything. Mary's death brought the family heartbreak and trauma but also economic ruin.

At the funeral home Betty went into the simple two room structure that was home to Mary's family and I joined the men in the yard. As in Zimbabwe and Botswana a bonfire was buring and all the men were sat around it. Many came and went. Some sat in silence whereas others chatted in Nyanja. Mary's father made me welcome and despite his grief ensureed that I was made to feel comortable at his home. I was almost embarrassed to be given the most comfortable seat in the tard whilst he himself sat on a battered old stool. I knew that to refuse his hospitality would have been to insult him so I accepted his welcome.

Mary's father and I chatted for some time until Betty emerged from inside the funeral house. He told me about Mary and how unselfish she was. She had worked incredibly hard and Hybrid and had reached middle management. Her career was the second most important thing in her life - after her family.

Mary left one young son. He was in his early teens. He was a well balanced and well rounded young man. He was bright, articulate and evidently well educated. Mary had been a single mother so her son was now an orphan. Tragically as well as losing his mother he would have to come to terms with other dramatic changes to his life. With his mothers passing away there would be no one to pay his school fees. The loss of a mother is tragic for any child but the implications of this loss would were immense.

Visiting an old friend in Zambia

It was just before Christmas three years ago that my wife Betty and I decided to visit Betty's old friend Mary whilst we were in Lusaka. Betty and Mary had worked together for many years and although they hadn't seen much of each other since Betty moved to Botswana they were still incredibly close. I'd only met Mary once and that was at our wedding so I was looking forward to spending time with her.

To catch up with Mary we went to the Hybrid Poultry Farm where Mary still worked. Betty went in and asked for Mary. We were told that Mary was unwell and that she had been admitted to the University Teaching Hospital. Betty was not unduly concerned though as she was reassured that Mary was recovering from her illness.

It was a couple of days later that Betty and I travelled to UTH to visit Mary. We'd have gone sooner but we had many people to see during our short time in Lusaka. The hospital was a vast building not too dis-similar to many post-war hospitals in the UK.

We knew which ward Mary was admitted to so we made our way straight there.

Upon arrival at the ward Betty asked for Mary. The nurse she spoke to asked us to wait one minute whilst she went to speak to the matron. The nurse soon returned with the matron to give us the news that Mary had passed away during the night...

Betty was obviously in deep shock. I was dumbfounded. Betty thanked the nurses for their assistance and we walked back to the car in silence.