Remembering Lucy Sichone On International Women’s Day!
Lusaka – 8th March, 2022.
The observation by the media Guru, Edem K. G. Djokotoe, caught my eye when it appeared in one daily. He said, “One of the biggest travesties of journalism in Zambia is that it has never made mining the biggest story in town even though it accounts for about 80 per cent of the country’s GDP and has been for as long as I can remember. If the media hasn’t taken a keen interest in the politics, the geology, the environmental issues, international market trends, the criminality, etc around it, why should the public care?”
Instead, some journalists are busy playing agents of the government that wishes to clip my wings for raising some very cardinal issues in this sector. What’s funny is that until now, the mainstream media has been publishing my articles, often times, without even acknowledging the source. In one article that has kept Hakainde Hichilema on the edge of the seat, I stated that instead of focusing on how Mopani Copper Mines for the first time, under the ownership of Zambians, has posted $60m profit after a decade of declaring losses by Glencore, Hakainde Hichilema and his puppet government want to give back KCM to a thief while his useful idiots insult me for speaking the truth.
I further stated that President Edgar Lungu chased Glencore because based on the Grant Thornton analysis, the company’s practices potentially cost the Zambian government up to £76m a year in lost corporation tax, according to Anna Thomas, head of tax policy at ActionAid. Anna pointed out that the amount was significantly more than the £59m the UK government gives Zambia each year in aid. So has the $60m profit not vindicated President Edgar Lungu’s decision to put the mines in the hands of Zambians? Why is Hakainde Hichilema keen on looking for outside investment when we have the money through the Lusaka Stoke Exchange and the human resource? Whose interests is he serving? Could it be that someone put money in his pre-election campaigns expecting to get the mines back should he win?
Instead of focusing on the issues I raise, why are some journalists busy playing agents of the government that wishes to clip my wings? The answer is money. Government is spending. But we don’t go into journalism to become rich or popular. It is our job to seek the truth and put constant pressure on our leaders until we get answers. The point of journalism is to hold people in positions of power accountable!
The debate about my credentials emenates from my sudden identity. When I returned to Zambia, I was an IT professional who touched positively the national ICT sector, many can attest to that. But even that was not not my first degree. My sudden change was necessitated by the death of my wife who was heavily involved with me. So I put one qualification away and took out another, probably one I should have started with in the first place.
Before I left Zambia, I would be in the Newsroom with Jowie Mwiinga, Sheikh Chifuwe, Catherine Mwewa, Bright Mwape, Bivani Saluseki et al. I was a student who could be anything but what these watchdogs used to do interested me a lot. I remember the resolve of this crop of journalists, to not just collect and report news but to dig deeper and report verifiable news not opinions. These journalists did not work for money but were conveyors of human rights and justice.
To date, very few of the current crop of journalists would even know why Lucy Sichone is a renowned name in the world of journalism. Let me discuss Lucy a bit!
In 1978, Lucy became the first Zambian woman to receive a Rhodes scholarship and went on to read for a BA in Politics, Philosophy and Economics at Oxford. She was one of a handful women in her course. Upon finishing her studies, Ms. Sichone returned to Zambia where she embarked upon a career as a lawyer focused on human rights issues. She represented people in the village whose land had been grabbed from them either by the State or by private citizens. She represented widows who had their property grabbed upon the passing away of their husbands, herself having earlier been a victim of this type of injustice. She represented people who had their rights violated by the State. Most of this she did for free.
In 1993, during the pivotal period when Zambia had just reverted to multiparty democracy and the ruling class were still using one-party strategies to stifle dissent, Lucy Sichone formed the Zambia Civic Education Association (ZCEA). ZCEA’s aim was to spread the gospel of human and democratic rights and to remind Zambians that it was not enough to have democracy on paper. We also had to make the demand, every minute and every hour, for our rights. ZCEA formed civic education clubs within secondary schools, her idea was to capture the imagination of the young whilst they could still dream. I am a beneficiary of Lucy’s dream.
But my memories of her emanate from when she joined the then Weekly Post as a columnist. It was during her time at the Post that two memorable events happened that thrust her into the limelight and confirmed her position as the conscience of the nation.
In February 1996, as I prepared my Critical Thinking paper as part of my BBA final year assignment, Ms. Sichone wrote an article titled “Miyanda has forgotten about the need for justice”. Godfrey Miyanda was then Vice President and leader of government business in Parliament. An order to arrest Ms. Sichone along with the newspaper’s Managing Editor and Chief Editor was issued. The three immediately went into hiding with the latter two eventually giving themselves up. But Ms. Sichone refused to do so and continued to write ever more scathing columns whilst in hiding. In one of them, she emphatically declared, “the freedoms enshrined in the Bill of Rights make it a sacred duty for me to defend them to the death.”
What we have today, if we are not careful, could lead to Journalism for Sale, an embarrassment to what Journalism ought to be in a democracy; putting constant pressure on our leaders until we get answers.
Rest well Mama Lucy Sichone and a Happy International Women’s Day to all the women in journalism and spouses to male journalists like my wife Angela Machona Mwewa!
Mpandashalo Evans Mwewa
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