FOR ZAMBIA, FOR LOVE!

This year’s Independence Anniversary is commemorated under the theme: Zambia @ 58: Promoting Inclusiveness towards a Sustainable Social and Economic Recovery. However, a selected and anointed few will be invited to State functions where cakes decorated in the Green, Black, Orange and Red – bought using taxpayers’ money – will be cut and eaten live on TV so that the majority of Zambians can watch and just whet their appetites. Drooling over these cakes will be their patriotic contribution. So much for inclusiveness. The rest of us will be included the way a Manchester United goalkeeper is included: present, essential and mostly watching the ball fly past.

Zambia is 58 years old. 58 years of self-rule and what do we have to show for it? As one famous politician once quipped: not much, not much. Why? Largely because of our own failures to seize opportunities that are scattered around our yard. And partly because of the fact that we are just a single household in the global village, where the neighbours’ goats sometimes wander into our garden, and the price of everything we buy is decided in somebody else’s kitchen.

 

Can I leave for another country? Maybe yes. Maybe not. I think I’m in love with this country. Despite the dirt, dust, disease and poverty marinated in corruption, lack of opportunities and bad politics. I am in an abusive relationship with my country and my body, emotions and socioeconomic status have plenty of scars to show for it. Every year I threaten to pack my bags at the first opportunity I get. Every year I surreptitiously ignore those opportunities.

My seemingly irrational attachment to Zambia can be perplexing to the uninitiated. There is a popular name for this kind of behaviour. In 1973, hostages held during a bank robbery in Stockholm came to sympathise with their captors and even defended them afterwards. The phenomenon was dubbed “Stockholm Syndrome,” and it entered the popular lexicon the following year. Is there something wrong with me? Am I a hostage who has started making tea for the kidnappers?

I have thought about it carefully, and the answer is no. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with me, and even if I had the choice of hating this country, my umbilical cord was buried here. I am forever attached to this country. In the words of Eric Donaldson, this is the Land of My Birth. A hostage longs to escape. I long for my captor to become a better version of herself. That is not a syndrome. That is patriotism

We need to develop a generation of patriots who will not just work for self-aggrandizement, but also realign the country on the development path. Patriots that will work to eradicate the vices that have confounded our beautiful country for the past 58 years. Friends, being Zambian has always meant perpetually navigate varying frontiers. Marking territories of successes, living in the present known and hoping for the better unknown tomorrow.

Patriotism is not just singing the anthem loudly at at fanctions, though I do that too. It is the civil servant who refuses the envelope under the table. It is the teacher who stays in a rural school when the transfer letter to Lusaka is one phone call away. It is the trader who pays her levy, the voter who queues in the sun, the young person who turns frustration into a business instead of despair. Patriotism decides the fate of a nation and is a critical building block for development and growth. It is also contagious. If those in leadership were patriotic, they would prioritise Zambia and Zambians in all they do, and in turn we would all be proud to be Zambian. But when citizens are asked to make sacrifices while the few eat cake on TV, patriotism starts to feel like an unpaid internship.

Patriotism has been tested many times since 1964, but it still smoulders.

Granted, we still have a lot to do to improve the lives of all Zambians. We should celebrate the progress made whilst at the same time incessantly work on the existing gaps. They are not mutually exclusive.  Let us count our blessings. When the entire Southern Africa was in flames during the liberation movements, Zambia was a haven for South Africans, Zimbabweans, Mozambicans, Angolans including Namibians. And in almost 31 years, we have peacefully changed presidents 7 times and been governed by 4 political parties. In a region where some presidents treat the constitution like a tenancy agreement they intend to renew forever, that is no small thing.

My Zambia is a beautiful country. She is the crown jewel of SADC, and our people are free. The only shackles we wear are the ones we vote in every five years, and we have shown we know how to take those off too. We have our valorous women, who carry households, markets, classrooms and boardrooms, sometimes all before lunch. We have our men, who rise before dawn to build and provide. And we have our vigilant youths, who will not hem and haw to kick out any complacent politician who forgets their mandate. From Muyombe to Shang’ombo, Livingstone to Chiengi, we speak many tongues but share the same stubborn hope. From the top of the Mafinga Hills at 2,329m above sea level to the bottom of the Zambezi River at 329m, across the Liuwa Plain, from the Kabompo River to the valleys of Chama and the beaches of Samfya.

For me Zambia, is like the Eagle’s Hotel California: I can check out any time I like but I (think) can never leave. I know exactly where the exit is. I just never seem to use it.

Today we cherish the ones who made our independence possible. We salute those who work tirelessly to perfect the Zambian dream. And we dream of an anniversary when the cake is big enough, and the table long enough, for every Zambian to get a slice. That will be inclusiveness.

Happy 58^th My Zambia. I stand and sing of you, proud and free.