Africa-Press – Zambia. Last Saturday, President Hakainde SAMMY Hichilema announced the creation of what he calls the Presidential Delivery Unit, herein referred to as PDU, with the mandate of ‘accelerating the implementation of high priority government programs and projects’.
President Hichilema further appointed Ms Kusobile KAMWAMBI who is currently serving as PS, Management Development Division as Head of the PDU and Chipokota MWANAWASA, currently working at State House as Special Assistant for Public Policy as Deputy Head of the PDU.
Zambians will remember that on 15th September 2021, President Hichilema appointed Dr Lawrence MWANAYANDA as his Special Assistant for Project Implementation and Monitoring whose mandate is akin if not exactly the same as that of the newly formed Presidential Delivery Unit.
Many stakeholders and ordinary Zambians have expressed legitimate concerns and skepticism against the newly formed so called Presidential Delivery Unit (PDU). We wish to join the voices of the many Zambians by asking Government to answer the following questions concerning the PDU;
1. Whenever the President appoints people, he categorically cites the authority or powers he has used to appoint the said individuals. Contrary to this general rule and common practice, President SAMMY did not cite any authority he used to appoint the PDU. Can the President cite which authority he used to appoint the PDU?
2. Who will be financing the PDU? which Budget line will they be using since they are not part and parcel of the established Government structure?
3. The President already appointed the Project Implementation and Monitoring Unit, isn’t the appointment of the PDU a duplication and an unnecessary cost on the treasury? Is this not the same bloating of Government and wastage of taxpayers’s money that President SAMMY vehemently opposed when he was in Opposition? Why should Zambians be paying two different Units of Government performing one and the same job?
4. The Constitution of Zambia in Article 114 gives Cabinet the sole authority to cause or ensure the implementation of all government programs and policies. Has the PDU taken over the powers of Cabinet whose function it is to ensure implementation of Government programs and policies? What role will Cabinet and line ministries be playing now that the role to implement Government programs and policies has been given to Chipokota and Kamwambi? Why then should Zambians continue to be paying hefty salaries and allowances to Cabinet Ministers when their powers and authority have been ‘stripped’ by Chipo and Kamwambi? Shouldn’t Cabinet be dissolved or be relegated to a department under PDU?
5. What criteria will Chipo and her friend Kamwambi be using to identify which programs, policies and projects are a priority and what will qualify a project to be priority?
6. What is the reporting structure of PDU? Ms Kamwambi is PS and she reports to the Secretary to Cabinet; now that she has been assigned to State House and the President, whom will she be reporting to? Who is now senior between her and the Secretary to Cabinet?
7. Between the Project Implementation Unit of Mwanayanda and the PDU of Kamwambi which one is above the other and which one will take precedence in operating and reporting or it will just be CHANGANYA; the one who sees the President first is the one who reports?
8. Looking at the far reaching powers and political influence that Chipo and Kamwambi have been given and the fact that they will have overriding authority in deciding which contracts gets priority, which contractor gets paid and so on, it, how will investigative wings of government such as ACC and DEC watchdog institutions such as Parliament and ordinary Zambians be holding them to account when they will be working under the powerful cover of State House and the President himself?
Surely, the Presidential Delivery Unit, in the manner it has been established and the mandate it has been given is akin to institutionalised corruption. We therefore demand that this Unit be dissolved and let Cabinet and the other duly established departments and units of Government be given their full mandate and authority to oversee the implementation of Government programs, policies and projects. We do not want to create some obscure untouchable ‘cartels’ that will be above the reproach of any authority other than State House and the President.
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