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Party of National Unity President Highvie Hamududu, Vice President Anthony Makuwa Lusaka and Secretary General Kasote Singogo 2017 Dec pix by ZADEMA
Media Statement (Thursday 1st March 2018)
STATUTORY Instrument no. 7 of 2018 issued by Transport and Communications Minister, Brian Mushimba ordering 30% transfer of all goods in transit from road to railway is tantamount to legislating business for Zambia Railways Limited (ZRL) and is sending a bad signal on the stability and predictability of the business regulatory environment in Zambia, which is not good for the growth of our economy at this critical stage.
What Zambia Railways Limited needs is a business solution and not a legal one. The Government must not hide the inefficiencies and uncompetitiveness of Zambia Railways Limited through legal protection or protectionist maneuvers, which clearly stand at variance with a liberal market.
Party of National Unity President Highvie Hamududu, Vice President Anthony Makuwa Lusaka and Secretary General Kasote Singogo 2017 Dec pix by ZADEMA
Brian Mushimba and Communications Director Yese Bwalya with Zambia Railway Board Chairperson Lubinda Linyama – Picture by MTC Zambia
As Party of National Unity (PNU), we hold a view that they are better and appropriate business solutions to making Zambia Railways Limited competitive with road transport.
Let government consider acceptable methods of revamping Zambia Railways Limited that make business and economic sense, for example; partially privatising it to attract appropriate capital and turnaround for the company that can create the optimal competitiveness that the road users can buy in.
The government must desist from looking for financing of Zambia Railways Limited through borrowing as the country has no space for that, as the Minister is hinting.
This is the same Zambia Railways Limited that swallowed the US$ 120 million Euro bond money, without producing a competitive turnaround.
The issue of big cargo damaging roads is an expired one as toll fees have created compensation for damages on the roads.
It looks like, the Ministries are working in silos as evidenced by the Ministry of Transport trying to save the roads from damage of heavy cargo, while the Ministry of Infrastructure and Housing, has addressed the issue of heavy cargo damaging roads, through compensatory road tolling.
I have high regard for the Minister of Transport and Communications, Hon Brian Mushimba, on his professionalism, but he is missing it on this one. Minister Mushimba’s SI no. 7 of 2018 is a missed call.
The Patriotic Front (PF) must learn lessons from their past, as running an economy through loads of Statutory Instruments (SI’s) can be very damaging to the domestic economy.
Let the government improve its tax administration on the mines and get what is truly due to the treasury and leverage on this revenue to bring about sustainable development, without unnecessarily invoking inhibiting protectionist laws.
Zambia is a free market economy and must uphold the its tenets, as a market economy that allows the free interplay of supply and demand, if investment is to flow in the country, to grow the economy and create employment.
Government must reverse this SI before it creates negative repercussions and sends wrong signals about the country’s policy certainty and predictability.
It is important to understand that there is fierce competition for investment in the global economy.
Highvie Hamududu, President Party of National Unity(PNU)
