{"id":953,"date":"2019-03-10T15:04:16","date_gmt":"2019-03-10T15:04:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wsm.prolerat.org\/?page_id=953"},"modified":"2019-10-21T00:45:19","modified_gmt":"2019-10-20T23:45:19","slug":"letter-from-zambia","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/wsm\/letter-from-zambia\/","title":{"rendered":"Letter from Zambia"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
December 2000, Zambia<\/pre>\n\n\n\n
This article has been reproduced from the Socialist Standard<\/em> (December\n2000), the monthly journal of The Socialist Party of Great Britain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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The impact of free market capitalism on\nZambian politics.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n
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\nThe wind of change is blowing across the African continent. This wind of\n change depicts a phenomenon of political coups which have swept through\n many African countries which had embraced the multi-party parliamentary\n system of government.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nThere is strife and bitter in-fighting between elected governments and \nopposition parties. The demise of single party totalitarian r\u00e9gimes has \nentailed the growth of neo-colonialism through economic liberalism and \nglobalisation. Before the demise of Soviet “Communism”, some African \ncountries were in the forefront of the state-run economies. The \neconomics of laissez-faire capitalism is proving a bitter pill to \nswallow to populations reared and groomed under the politics of \ntotalitarian r\u00e9gimes and state or command economies. What is alarming is\n the recourse to communalism and outright tribalism by opposition \nparties against elected governments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nThe defeat of Kenneth Kaunda’s U.N.I.P. government by Frederick \nChiloba’s M.M.D.\nparty has wrought a permanent change upon Zambia’s political and \neconomic life. The dismantling of a state command economy by the\nM.M.D. government has let loose social and demographic changes \nthroughout Zambia. Income and job patterns have changed from bad to \nworse.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nFree trade and economic liberalism have appeared as an affront to the \nnationalistic sentiments of many an African political malcontent. \nOutright economic dependence on European trade and international \ncommerce is neo-colonialism per se. But can any African country survive \nwithout any form of economic aid from the developed capitalist \ncountries? In Zambia the goal of the politics of transparency and free \ntrade has been purchased at a high price. Privatisation of the state \neconomic sector has brought into being unprecedented job losses and \nindustrial dislocation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nNeo-colonialism depicts a situation where the country’s domestic economy\n is exposed to foreign or overseas multinational companies. \nPrivatisation has created a new class of industrial capitalists whose \ncommercial and employment objectives are at variance with the \nmacroeconomic objectives of governments. Under neo-colonialism a \nrecipient country is held in dire servitude by the donor community which\n monitors its political and economic performance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nThe creation of S.A.D.C.C. (Southern African Development Co-ordination \nConference) has led to a relaxation of tariffs and quotas between member\n countries. In the case of Zambia this has meant that imports from South\n Africa, where economies of scale abound and production costs are low, \nhave come to over-flood the relatively undeveloped and high-cost \ndomestic industrial sector. As a result most manufacturing industries in\n Zambia have closed since they cannot compete in quality and price with \nthese imported commodities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nThe policy of arresting an imbalance in of payments by clamping down on \nsubsidies and public expenditure has led to unemployment and social \nmisery across the country. It has brought a bout of unprecedented \ncriticism from the opposition back benches. Zambian economic liberalism \ndepends upon massive injections of donor investment and aid to survive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nPersistent political bickering and unsubstantiated criticisms against \nelected governments are tarnishing the image of African parliamentary \ndemocracy as a test case in multi-partism. It portrays and signifies a \nlack of trust in the concept of democracy and is causing suspicion and \nanxiety among the Western donor community circles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nVoter apathy and outright arrogance against the ruling parties has \nbecome a general feature in every African country under multi-party \nrule. Ethnic rivals and tribal prejudices are exploited by opposition \nparties in order to discredit elected governments. It seems that \nparliamentary democracy under the European political pattern cannot \neasily survive in Africa and that African countries will have to live \nexposed to the threat of military coups.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Author: Kephas Mulenga<\/pre>\n\n\n\n
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Back to the Politics Index<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n
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Back to the World Socialist Movement home page<\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
December 2000, Zambia This article has been reproduced from the Socialist Standard (December 2000), the monthly journal of The Socialist Party of Great Britain. The impact of free market capitalism on Zambian politics. The wind of change is blowing across the African continent. This wind of change depicts a phenomenon of political coups which have…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"magazine_newspaper_sidebar_layout":"","footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-953","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/wsm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/953","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/wsm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/wsm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/wsm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/wsm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=953"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/wsm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/953\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2612,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/wsm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/953\/revisions\/2612"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/wsm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=953"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}