Hon Bowman Lusambo writes:
President Hichilema, please hear the cry of UNZA students
It was heart wreaking to see UNZA students braving the Lusaka heat to walk to State House seeking to be addressed by President Hakainde Hichilema.
Ordinarily, our students should be busy preparing for their exams beginning next week but they had to walk the tarmac to have audience with the Head of State over the happenings at campus.
Off course they were blocked from seeing the President and that is where we have a problem with President Hichilema and the way he is running his government.
We know from our friends in the diplomatic community that securing an appointment to see President Hichilema at State House or at his Community House is one of the easiest things to do, the President is ever so willing to meet and chat with all manner of foreigners and pretend to be working. His Facebook page is littered with hundreds of photos of him meeting western diplomats and businessmen but he failed to meet students who had a genuine matter they wanted to table with him.
We have come to a harsh conclusion, it is easier for President Hichilema to meet western people who are visiting him willy nilly but our own students have to be blocked by armed police from meeting him.
When he campaigned, he promised he will run an open dooor policy at State House. We wish to remind him that the student populace is a large constituency which he will not manage to ignore. President Hichilema needs to open up his doors and hear the cries from the students.
Conspicuously, even his Facebook handlers have decided to totally ignore the happenings at UNZA as if they live in a different planet. When in opposition, each time there was student unrest at UNZA, he was one of the first people to write long essays condemning the PF for neglecting higher education and offering a litany of possible solutions.
Leadership is about consistency, integrity and trustworthiness and we are advising President Hichilema to be sincere in his approach to leadership. UNZA is one of the first leadership tests and he is failing.
If he was a still a student at UNZA, President Hichilema would only receive a C for atleast instructing the Police not to beat up the students.