Speech by His Excellency Dr. Edgar Chagwa Lungu President of the Republic of Zambia and Commander-in-Chief of the Defence Force, at the official opening of Blue Angels Primary School and the Ibex Hill Police Post Friday, 24th January, 2020 State House Lusaka

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• The Secretary General of the Patriotic Front, Mr. Davies Mwila;
• Honourable Cabinet and Provincial Ministers present;
• Service Chiefs;
• Your Worship the Mayor of the greater City of Lusaka;
• The Deputy Air Force Commander and Chief of Air Staff;
• Senior Government officials present;
• Air Officers Commanding;
• The Commandant, Ibex Aviation Town;
• Station Commanders;
• Commanding Officers;
• Retired Senior Officers;
• Senior Officers;
• Warrant officers;
• Senior and Junior Non-Commissioned officers;
• Distinguished Guests;
• Members of the Press;
• Ladies and Gentlemen:

I wish to express my gratitude to you Air Force Commander, for inviting me to officially open the Blue Angels Primary School, and the Police Post here in Ibex Hill.  I am pleased with what I have seen culminating from the Zambia Air Force Public Private Partnership Project.

Ladies and Gentlemen:

Zambia is a growing economy and for meaningful development to take place, we need concerted efforts from all stakeholders. There is need for us to pursue and implement programmes of mutual interest for government and its partners to achieve success.

I have no doubt that the integrated approach which my government is using to drive the objective of delivering on our development agenda is already yielding results.  This approach is aimed at promoting and increasing joint planning and coordination among government line ministries and institutions.

Air Force Commander:

It is, therefore, gratifying that you have adopted this integrated development approach in the implementation of development projects to complement government efforts, and in particular in improving the education sector.

I wish to commend you for taking such an initiative to construct the blue angels primary school here at the ZAF Ibex Hill Aviation Town.  I am equally glad that in this project you considered facilities with direct benefit to the local community to be completed first.

Ladies and Gentlemen:

The Zambia Air Force Ibex Aviation Town has well over one thousand households with children of primary school going age. Therefore, the, blue angels primary school is timely, and will provide quality primary education to the children here in line with government’s education policy.

In implementing this policy, government has made strides in achieving quality and equitable access to education.

In the primary education sector, we have increased participation and access to quality education through the construction of new primary schools, and the construction of additional classroom blocks in the existing primary schools.

The construction of school infrastructure is critical to meeting the requirements of the growing population.

This school we are officially opening today, is a clear testimony of the government and stakeholder partnership in implementing the education policy.

I am happy that my directive to government ministries and institutions to collaborate on cross cutting issues has been adhered to. And the fruit of this collaboration is what we are witnessing today. It is indeed, encouraging to see the growing collaboration between the Zambia Air Force, its sister services, and other government ministries.

Ladies and Gentlemen:

We have made strides in implementing free primary education; introducing information communication technology as a compulsory subject; revising the curriculum to introduce the use of the seven local languages; recruiting teachers to improve the teacher-pupil ratio, as well as constructing teacher’s houses.

Let me assure you that government will continue to formulate and implement policies and programmes aimed at increasing access to quality, and equitable education.

Ladies and Gentlemen:

I am pleased to note that a police post has also been built through the Public Private Partnership Consortium of developers to provide a much needed service to the community.

Having been taken on a conducted tour of the police post, I am comforted that precautionary measures were taken into consideration to ensure that this development is environmentally friendly.

I have been assured that the Zambia Air Force is working with various environmental monitoring and regulatory bodies to meet all the requirements for an environmentally friendly project, in accordance with the Environmental Management Act no.12 of 2011.

In this regard, let me urge other developers to ensure that all developmental projects are done in an environmentally sustainable manner.

Ladies and gentlemen:

The ZAF Twin Palm Public Private Partnership project has revealed a healthy balance between infrastructure development and environmental protection.

I wish to take this opportunity to commend the air force commander and his team for actualising this public private partnership model. This has always been my government’s desire to leverage the public private partnerships in infrastructure development.

I urge you to continue working with   stakeholders to ensure that mutual benefits for all are achieved, and for the betterment of our people.

As I conclude, I wish to thank all those who contributed to the fruition of the two projects by working tirelessly.

To the community, you have a responsibility to take good care of this infrastructure which is being developed at very huge cost to benefit even future generations.

I now declare the blue angels primary school, and the ibex hill police post officially opened.

I thank you and God Bless us all.