 Mikiwa na kwa nisha. Mikiwa na deprimata nisha, nisha nisha hawa pwarku zussi. Nisha nisha na niwa. Nisha mikiwa maqafia kuwa maqafi nisha mikiwa wa maqafi kwa Kuniama na maqafi maqafia nagu ي قال na kata maqafia maqafia nisha maqafia niwa maqafia niwa maqafia nisha. I have not been, as you all know, I've expressed some displeasure with that. Sometimes it's not what they do, it's the way they do it. It's almost as if the opinion or concerns or thoughts of their electorate, the people who put them in power are irrelevant. There was no consultation, there was no deliberation. There was nothing to show that at least our views are respected or considered. They just woke up one day and decided they are going to abolish these things. Now the country is divided, some say it's good, some say it's bad. I don't think it's good in the sense that first of all we have to understand why those laws were on the books in the first place. Yes, I understand they've been there since independence and even before independence, but is it a priority? Is it truly necessary? Are we ready? These are important questions that need to be answered. You don't just wake up one morning and say we're going to remove them. And what I find more unsettling than even the lack of consultation is the fact that, look, I've been studying Zangren politics since I was 19 years old. I wasn't born yesterday. I've been studying Zangren politics since I was 19 years old. These are diplomats who are bringing these laws in Zangren. Make no mistake about that. Of course I can't prove it, I can only suspect based on my experiences and how I know how these political things operate. This is not our end of state talking. This is a diplomat stalking through our head of state to us. No consultation. These are diplomats stationed in Musaikan, telling the president that removed defamation of the law, removed death penalty. Why? Because we have removed it in Europe. Well, at independence it was there. We adopted those laws from Britain. So we adopted, we copied it. Okay, fine. But first forward, some 58 years later when they have removed those laws, now they come to us and say, remove them as well. So does that mean that whatever they say we have to do? No consultation with the people, no going to the people and say, Muema Zandans, how do you feel about this? Are you comfortable with it? Even if it's what the government wants to do, they can present their case forward and say, we have a responsible need to lead and therefore we are going to lead and let us explain to you properly why we are getting rid of this, but tell us what your concerns are as well. You mean you can't debate with your people, even if you have the right to remove it, you can't engage your people and your lawmakers to say what are the prongs and cons? Are we ready? Is it wise? Do we have the resources to entertain a scenario where there is no death penalty, where there is no defamation of prisoners? Look, the diplomats in Losaka have become too powerful. The foreign diplomatic corps in Losaka has become too powerful. They are calling the shots. They are bringing their ideologies in zampe. It may bother some people and it may not bother others, but I think it's a bit unsettling. How the diplomats, foreign diplomats have assumed so much power and that power extends to the minds, but it also extends to how we are living in Mozambique in terms of should we have the death penalty or not? Should we have the defamation of the president law or not? Listen, I already explained last week or the week before then that a president does not have anyone executed. They do not have to sign that paper. They can exercise what we call prerogative of mercy. If the president doesn't want to hang anyone or to have anyone hanged, they can exercise prerogative of the president, prerogative of mercy rather. That's in the law. But you don't have to scrap the death penalty out of the books completely. Keep it in the books so that it's there and people know that it's there and there's always a possibility that it could be enforced if someone does something that is so heinous and destructive to society. You see what I'm saying? So first of all, it's just not necessary. It's not relevant. We've got other things to deal with. We've got other things to think about. But just because Europe feels that it's now old fashioned and they don't want it anymore, they come to Zambia and impose those things, now are today there. But rest assured it doesn't just end there. This was easy. It was small potatoes for them to take away. Even when they said remove defamation of the president because we don't have defamation of the president in Europe. In our African culture, we are taught to respect our elders. We are taught to respect our leaders. It is part of our value system. Even as we provide, even as we exercise democracy, we should not get into that business of insulting the presidents. There is a code of conduct, a culture that we must adhere to. Yes, I understand it has gotten out of line. People have shown a lot of disrespect to the president, not just the current one, but even the previous ones. That is unsettling. But removing the defamation of the president law obviously doesn't remedy the problem. In fact, it might even make it worse. The insults will now just be all over the place. But it's of no use. It's not good. On the other hand, the defamation of the president law was being misused and abused. So maybe it's a good law to remove. But remove it out of our own accord, our own understanding and our own agreement, not just because the European diplomats have told you to remove it, so you remove it. What's the point of having a president? Remove the death penalty. You know there are people who do ritual killings, there are people who can do mass murder, there are people who can do espionage, there are people who can do such serious heinous crimes, that they need to know that the death penalty is a possibility. Look, anyway, the point is whether it's right or wrong, that's a whole different matter. But the fact that we have European diplomats stationed in Lusag telling us what to do, I think is a bit uncertain. If they have their way, I mean they have tested the waters on this and I'm not going to go so deep into it. But if they had their way and they've been testing the waters, panu no panu no badeven dere rafia fi, badefa ya dere ashi ya wa umiukutema wa umiawa nakashukutema wana kashu. Okay, listen, I'm not going to do too much on that. I believe that we should respect as long as someone is a human being, respect everybody, treat everybody with respect and with dignity, have no hatred, cause no harm, cause no injury. I believe on those much bigger, wider deeper concepts. But my point is if there are any laws that ever happen in Zambia, let them happen out of deliberation and debate among Zambians, between Zambians and their leaders, not because we are finished and bashed in the vanuatia, if you refer to Zambia, or Swedish embassy, if you refer to Zambia, so much they feel. We wish that we are even in the building. Panu no panu. They know that it's not something that will be accepted so fast. So, wakula chaya fe panu no panu until it sneaks into society and becomes wide accepted. Look, that's a whole different debate altogether. My point is have we become a perfect regime? That's my point. We can have debate on all these social issues and what's acceptable and what's not acceptable, what's cultural and what's not cultural, what's religious and what's not religious. We say I'm not going to hate anybody, I'm not going to disrespect anybody, I'm going to love everybody, I will respect everybody or treat everybody with respect and with dignity because those are the concepts that I'm trying to promote for myself and my followers. But, but what I find unsettling is the fact that Europeans think that we can just come to Zambia using their diplomats and their ambassadors and their high commissioners to be pushing us around and injecting these things in Zambia. And what is independence for? It means 1964 was irrelevant. Then don't even say Zambia is a sovereign state, it's not. This, ladies and gentlemen, is a perfect regime. We have never had a perfect regime. We've had Zambian governments that have been aligned either to the east or west or none aligned. We've been able to hold our ground one way or another. But I've never seen anything like what we are seeing right now. I have never seen such spineless leadership in Zambia. Now by the end of the day people have to decide whether that's okay or whether that's not, to what extent they're able to accept that, and it could also be a bargain between economic progress and losing some of our independence. By the end of the day people have to decide. It could be that, you see, again, the president in his last press conference said that there are certain things, especially in the mining sector, that will be unlocked in the first quarter of 2023. So these investments will yield and we'll start seeing results if that happens great, good, because I want us to get out of this economic hardship. If his alliances and his devotion to his western friends yields economically the progress and development and jobs for Zambia, maybe by the end of the day people will be willing to accept that as a bargain, economic prosperity in exchange for losing some of our independence. It's up to people, it's not up to me, it's up to people to decide if that's what they're willing to accept. It's up to people, either economics or independence. It's a bargain, we live in a world of bargain, we live in a world of negotiation. So maybe they'll give us all the sweets and chocolates and biscuits in exchange for us doing what they tell us to do. But there's a deeper dark side to this. They are not just trying to spread their ideology, they are after our minds. That's why I keep telling people, be careful with privatization part two, because privatization part two is a real possibility. They are sneaky. It's not enough to just spread their ideology. It's called neo-colonialism, neo-colonialism, yeah, I can't pronounce it. You know there was colonization, where they came physically incapacitated us and physically took our minnows and took it kufiaro fiawa. But ever since independence, what they said, mumma meetings yawawa sumbawa, that's the reality. Let them have their independence, it's okay, but they can't feel your feeling. Let them have power, one for whom we know. Let them lead the show. But when it comes to economics, iriakwena, we are going to be so involved. So the system that they developed was one of remote control. Neo-colonialism, but neo-colonialism has become a phenomenon that came later on. Because what happened after independence, there was what you call the Cold War, where people had to choose between East and West. And there was that program, yawawa C.I.A., yawawa kwa kwa kwa kwa kwa kwa kwa kwa kwa kwa kwa kwa. M16, yawawa Ku-Britain, and these yawawa shushushus from other countries. That program was designed in such light. If you are an African president standing for your people, yawawa H.Tasai dinawa East, wa Communist, nishi, the Ucani woman is to have you taken out. If you have had it, that was at the height of the Cold War. Because the stakes were very high, it was a serious, dangerous competition between East and West. But the Berlin War Film 1989 and the Cold War came to an end. And those African presidents who were siding with the East, they were told you have to democratize, you have no choice, you don't have power, you don't have the Soviet Union backing you anymore. So you now have to democratize. Which was good. So we democratized. We democratized. Okay, fine. Can we do a Soviet Union? They are no longer power. They can't give back us. They can't give us what we need. The now dominant force is the West. So African dictators were forced to democratize. They were forced to privatize. And some of them put up some resistance. Some of them impressed it with both hands. Some became radical capitalists. But you see one thing that has remained stubbornly the same. Between that time when the Soviet Union collapsed and Zambians democratized and Africa, the wave of democracy was sweeping across Africa. Africa democratized in the 1990s. It is going into the 90s. Between that time and today, the percentage of Africans living in poverty at that time is still the same percentage today. It is the same. It is the same percentage today. So in 1991, 85% of Zambians were living in poverty. 1991 we democratized. We capitalized. We started kissing the IMF and the World Bank. From 1991 to today so much has happened. We've gravitated west, we've gravitated east. We've invited the IMF. We've qualified for the HIPIK initiative. We've hired indebted pokuntles initiative. At some point we brought the debt down to zero. Now it has gone up to almost 30 billion. A total debt. So many things have happened between 1991 and today. I think we've had about 5 or 6 presidents. And yet the percentage of Zambians living in poverty today is still the same percentage or more than the percentage of Zambians living in poverty in 1991. Powa.