UNZA Students taste sweet Bally freedom
OVER 3,000 students of the volatile University of Zambia which is known to hold more riots than graduation ceremonies, today marched from the institution’s campus on Great East Road up to Long Acres area in their failed Great Trek to meet the Head of State at State House.
The students not only wanted to share an afternoon of Chibwantu with the Republican President, but sought to ask for special treatment from the rest of Zambians as they want their school not to be subjected to any load shedding as is the case with the rest of the country.
The students, who mostly only have Grade 12 certificates to their names and an admission letter to the university, also want the government to give them the power to fire their Vice Chancellor, an accomplished academician, Prof Luke Mumba, on allegations that he was asking those not on government scholarships to own up and pay their fees, was not collecting garbage from their rooms and had allegedly failed the institution.
However, for all their mischief and youth misapplication of energy, the monks and momas, as the students refer to themselves, were allowed by the New Dawn government to carry out their protest without police permit.
Unlike under former PF government where students had to be killed and maimed by the police for attempting to protest, today’s protest was more of a carnival as the police tucked in their buttons and instead took selfies with their protesting former enemies leading to onlookers to wonder if the draconian Public Order Act under whose name police broke limbs and killed protesting students had been abolished.
Kalemba November 9, 2021