Africa-Press – Zambia. Chief Government Spokesperson Chusi Kasanda has said that insinuations in some sections of the media that President Hakainde Hichilema has abolished allowances for civil servants are false and malicious.
Ms. Kasanda who is also Information and Media Minister has said that at no point did President Hichilema talk about abolishing civil servants’ allowances during the swearing-in ceremony of some senior Government officials at State House, yesterday.
She says President Hichilema only revealed that he will be having a workshop for Ministers and Permanent Secretaries next week and that there will be no allowance to be paid on that day because all those attending including himself will be working.
According to her Facebook page monitored by ZNBC News in Lusaka today, Ms. Kasanda said the Head of State in his remarks only disapproved of practices in the previous regime where government officials were paid allowances for attending workshops or meetings on normal working days and within the normal working hours.
President Hichilema assured the nation that, under his watch, this will never happen. And echoing the Minister’s statement, UPND Alliance Media Director Thabo Kawana said that says President Hichilema has not abolished any allowances for civil servants as reported by some sections of the media.
UPND Alliance Media Director Thabo Kawana Mr. Kawana said that the misrepresentation of facts is a deliberate misconception and distortion and that the media report is aimed at deliberately agitating Civil Servants in the country and bringing the New Dawn Administration into disrepute.
Mr. Kawana has clarified that President Hichilema tasked Cabinet Office to convene a day’s workshop for all Ministers and Permanent Secretaries who will in turn hold meetings with their Directors and other Senior Government Officials on how they are expected to execute their duties in the New Dawn Administration.
He says the head of State was categorical that this one-day workshop will not attract an allowance because as it will be treated as an ordinary day’s work.
Mr. Kawana told ZNBC news that the President was clear, emphatic, and did not mince his words to warrant the unfortunate misrepresentation of what he stated.
He has since urged media houses, reporters and their editors to strive to report correctly and resist the temptation to sensationalize facts in the process.
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