THE DIMINISHING ROLE OF CIVIL SOCIETY IN ZAMBIA’S DEMOCRACY
By Melicious Chongo
Voice, accountability and transparency are crucial for the survival of every democracy.
They are the quiteessence for the survival of democracy. Democracy thrives on them; they’re the building blocks of every meaningful democracy. And this is where the role of civil society comes in.
They represent the voice of the masses. Their voice is essential for providing checks and balances, for calling our leaders to account for their actions. And only this way transparency is enhanced.
Thus, it is a source of concern that the last 18 months have seen the asphyxiation of the voice of civil society. Civil society has been totally squeezed, and cannot breathe. Very few, if none at all, are breathing.
Everyone instead has joined in the symphony of praise singing. It’s either they have all joined the caravan of praise singing or they have become the silencers of the voice of truth themselves. Laura Miti is gone, Gilbert Phiri is gone, Mwangala Zaloumis is gone, McDonald Chipenzi is gone, and Chama Fumba, aka Pilato, is gone!
However, what is even more worrying is the manner in which the silencing is happening. The diminished role of civil society in Zambia’s democracy today cannot be said to be a haphazard process. It is a deliberate and well calculated move.
In my view, there are three to four forces driving up the suppression of the voice of civil society. First, there’s what I’m calling the external elite, that is, U S and the West. Second is the failure on the part of our leaders to separate government from party politics.
Government is seen as an extension of the party and as a personal to holder property. This tendency partly also accounts for the creation of elitism/caderism. And this is what happens when voice and accountability goes in a society.
The third force/reason is the greed among our leaders. Professor Muyunda Mwanalushi, a Copperbelt University lecturer once charged that today “politics has unfortunately come to be seen as the fastest track to economic self-advancement, not the means for serving the nation’’.
And fourth, the failure among our leaders to understand their role in the management of public affairs.
But the two, the external elites and domestic leadership’s failure to understand their role very often combine with very desastrous results on the affairs of the country.
On one hand, when the external elite – in this case, U S and the West – want to give you aid and invest in your country, it is common for them to place conditions.
Among them these may include silencing the voice of civil society, and the unions. On another hand, when you have weak local elite (leadership) that is amenable to the demands of the external elites, they’ll submit.
So it is not hard to see what is happening here. The new dawn government is in a hurry to play to the needs of the West, so they have no option but to play politics of appeasement and sell their souls to the West at the expense of demostic democracy and the economy.
They’re playing double standards: they’re canningly silencing the voice of civil society and thereby killing democracy while at the same time preaching democracy.
You cannot claim to restore democracy and the credibility of the nation while at the same time killing the same building blocks of democracy, such as voice, plurality, and accountability.
You cannot be said to be accountable and transparent while at the same time stifle the same voice that calls you to account. But this is what Hakainde Hichilema (HH) and the new dawn government have done in the last 18 months in office.
However, this is happening for a purpose. The weaker the civil society the better for them because when everyone else is silent, then it is right time for them to steal. Thus, an environment of silence is indeed a recipe for corruption.
To put it in a different way, infrastructures of silence are infrastructures of corruption. So let’s not cheat ourselves, just as in the previous administration, corruption is still very much going on even with the current administration. Only the modalities have changed. Now it is happening in a slow shrewed way in the name of “restoring democracy!”
Hence, HH’s claim of restoring democracy is but just merely politically correct language, which otherwise is empty and full of contradictions in fact!
Unlike the PF who chose infrastructures of cadreism as their vehicle for stealing the nation, silencing the voice of civil society, and being politically correct is his chosen modality for stealing the nation.
It is his chosen way of fooling the nation into believing that they’re clean and “those” are the ones who are stealing! Therefore, infrastructures of cadreism, infrastructures of silence, infrastructures of being politically correct, and politics of appeasement are just the same. They are all different vehicles towards the same destination: stealing the nation/corruption.
True democracy cannot be said to be restored and to thrive untill we learn to allow all talents their full expression in a society. Every part of the society has its purpose to serve. Left to itself, the government cannot fully exist and function.
No one has the monopoly of wisdom. This is the more reason why we need the civil society to provide a voice, and checks and balances. It compliments and completes government in its deficiencies. Civil society helps prevent government’s excesses.
Once civil society is gone or silenced, that is the moment government itself goes into excesses. It is the beginning of moral decay within government. Sadly, this is the path we have seen the new dawn government has taken.
They have chosen to play the nice guy for U S and the West, and to kill the local democracy. Let civil society breathe, then democracy will breathe. And the best way to unlock rigidity is to let civil society breathe.
Voice, accountability, transparency, and respect for other views can only rain in a democracy if all other actors are given their space to operate. They restore confidence and trust in institutions and leaders.
Plurality is the essence of democracy. Since assuming office, HH has paraded himself as a saviour of Zambia’s democracy, one who’s come to restore trust and confidence in institutions.
But it is my view that there can be no better way of restoring trust and confidence in institutions than by allowing the voice of civil society to grow even stronger, rather than stifle it. It is not only contradictory but also dangerous and hypocritical to endeavor to restore trust and confidence in the international affairs while you destroy the same in the domestic affairs.
But this is what HH and the new dawn government have successfully done so far! And slowly but sadly the voice of civil society is diminishing, and before long Zambia will have to pay a heavy price for this.
The author is an International Relations scholar. Send comment to: +260 979-54903.
File Photo Courtesy of Action Aid.