A TRADITIONAL leader in Sinazongwe district says he expects 2021 to be tougher than 2020 and has urged all Zambians to tighten their belts.
In an interview, senior headman Simankawa in chief Mweemba’s area said no one knows how the economic hardships would leave the country.
“Next year requires us to tighten our belts due to a lot of challenges that has shaken the country. And no one knows how the economic hardships coupled with debts will leave us,” Simankawa said. “We pray to God to have mercy on us. Our country has shaken from lack of money and this has made our government to struggle and above that, next year we are having an election.”
The traditional leader urged politicians in the country to consider the majority less privileged people in society when making decisions.
“We are living in a crucial time and as the country goes to the polls next year we need all politicians to think about those in rural areas like Sinazongwe, how hard life might be for them amidst economic hardships,” Simankawa said.
And the traditional leader feared that the reduction of packs under the Farmer Input Support Programme in Southern Province would aggravate the hunger situation in the area.
“There is nothing more a farmer can get from e-voucher that can change lives. Here in Sinazongwe we are largely peasant farmers who depend on support from government but now that we are only able to redeem three bags of fertiliser and one pocket of seed, it means that now we are completely finished especially that life is already hard owing to the economic hardships in the country,” Simankawa lamented.
He complained that the government had not considered peasant farmers in Sinazongwe district.
“The current number of packs we are able to redeem is not suitable even at garden level because it’s too little. And our conclusion is that this e-voucher thing is no longer suitable for farmers,” said Simankawa. “Next season let government revert us to the old system of FISP. The Ministry of Agriculture should go on the ground to assess the negative impact of the system they are using in Southern Province. We expected that maybe we will harvest well in this season due to good rains so far such that we had even gone back to our usual crops of millet and sorghum compared to hardships we experienced in 2019 season. Now the only hiccup is that the inputs are not enough to support our efforts.”