By Shalala Oliver Sepiso
In the past few weeks, the press has been awash with the potential damage the Kangaluwi Mine can cause in the Lower Zambezi National Park (LZNP). We have many so-called environmentalists and conservationists piping this call even though most of them have never even been to Lower Zambezi and don’t know what is happening there. Honesty is the best policy. Those against the mine won’t rub off truths and facts off the face of the earth. Most of them have never been to Lower Zambezi. Most people have their minds made up based on myths and lies. But it is not shocking. We Zambians are like that. We are lazy to see for ourselves and this is why foreigners mine our sugilite and gold because they go to see for themselves in the bush while we debate in Lusaka on WhatsApp. Many of these so-called environmentalists and conservationists are simply parroting things they don’t even know about but have just been told to talk about. They can’t even afford tourism in the Lower Zambia. Black Zambians just can’t afford tourism in Lower Zambezi National Park. Both access to and profits from LZNP are a preserve for non-Zambians and not even government.
I am therefore writing this article just to help the debate and because it is long I shall continue next time from where I end today.
MINING DOESN’T MEAN END OF TOURISM IN LOWER ZAMBEZI NATIONAL PARK
In part one, let me make it clear that the existence of Kangaluwi Mine in the Lower Zambezi doesn’t mean the end of tourism. It actually means better chances of animals existing there as currently its it free for all. People are poaching willy-nilly as the Department of National Parks doesn’t have the capacity to patrol the whole park and stop poachers. Lower Zambezi is 5000 square kilometres and very remote with no roads. DNPW doesn’t have All-Terrain Vehicles, ordinarily vehicles or aeroplanes to aid their patrols. Poachers are poaching because the NGOs, like Conservation Lower Zambia, that prophesy to love and care for the whole national park, do not care about the whole park but only put resources around the Western end of the park near Chiawa where the white lodge owners operate from the establishments they own or work with.
There is a lot of poaching and illegal mining by those in tourism. With legalised and regulated mining, we shall not have government losing revenue. This is the case of the Sugilite saga. What we need is to mine but through legal means. Zambia needs to grow the economy.
LOWER ZAMBEZI IS CURRENTLY NEGLECTED AND IS A SHAM
When one reads about Lower Zambia, it is touted as a wonderland of tourism. The truth is shameful.
- Most of the park is not patrolled by the Department of National parks and Wildlife (DNPW) officers because there is just no capacity to do so. Currently the northern half, or even two-thirds, of the national park is not patrolled by DNPW police or anyone else. Who protects animals between Salt Pan and Luangwa to the East and Rufunsa to the north? No one. The park is currently unattended to because the tourism sector in Lower Zambezi is a scam. A lot of illegal economic activity is going on in the park and these vocal foreign NGOs and the white lodge owners don’t care as long as the area where the white lodge owners operate is safe and they hold monopoly of the park. All DNPW officers and community scouts are deployed in the valley and Chiawa area. For selfish reasons. As a result, we have places like Chimusanya, which sells wild game meat to the public with impunity, simply because more than half of over Zambezi National Park has no patrols and helps to supply this illegal game meat through poaching.
- No one cares enough to do the roads in the park. These are the roads officers of DNPW are supposed to use to deploy those on duty for patrols. There has been no work on the roads in the last two decades save for the Chiawa Road alone which services lodges. Last year, Mwembeshi Resources Limited, after many years graded the road from Luangwa at Chief Mphuka’s Palace to Salt Pan in Zambezi Valley. Mwembeshi Resources Limited also graded the road from Salt pan in Zambezi Valley to Mukamba gate last year. However, the lodge owners were not happy and one morning the cut across the road to make it impassable and one tourist almost died when his car careered off the road at this point near Salt Pan. The lodge owners have never graded the Mukamba Road from Senjela to Chakwenga Mine to Salt Pan. This is because they don’t want Zambians to be able to drive from Lusaka and view animals in Zambezi Valley and then go back home without paying for the cost of lodges. When you ask the lodge owners why they dont grade these roads, they say that “it is the government’s duty to develop road infrastructure”. The truth is government needs help from private sector to develop our nation. In the last 20 years only Mwembeshi Resources has (twice) and the World Bank (once) ever worked on this road. The last work on this road (from 2022 to 2023) was done at more than USD 3 million due to the complex nature of the terrain and remoteness. These roads by Mwembeshi will allow patrols by DNPW. In fact, when the mine is operational, we shall employ our own scouts as well as accommodate DNPW police within the mine area, give DNPW officers rations, give DNPW cars to patrol and so do other roads on the park to allow for access for patrols. Current existing businesses in the park are paying lip service and playing the blame game which the vocal minority has bought hook, line, tackle, bait, floater and sinker!
- The truth is that DNPW in Lower Zambezi is not supported. In Lower Zambezi, DNPW has been short-changed by tourism operators and it has been abused and reduced to a bystander. We need to change Lower Zambezi into a better place that works for Zambians. Especially black Zambians. There is no electricity for the offices and homes for officers at Mukamba Gate. There is no patrol car at Mukamba Gate to deploy officers in the vicinity or to chase poachers. The only cars in the park operate around the lodges in the Zambezi Valley. These few cars available in the LZNP have GPS managed by an NGO. Additionally, DNPW officers at Mukamba Gate or within Lower Zambezi National Park don’t have their own radio receivers or pagers. They rely on radios and pagers controlled by an NGO which directs their movements. This means government units are being controlled by foreign NGOs and this is why we have serious illegal mining in Lower Zambezi and lots of poaching. When DNPW officers want to check a certain area where there is poaching or illegal mining, they are told by radio to move to another place. When they use vehicles to move, their location is seen by GPS and those controlling them can manouvre their illegal activities. Since DNPW operations in the park are controlled by an NGO, this has compromised the integrity of the GRZ supervisory role in this park. Additionally, DNPW officers in Lower Zambezi are starving because their rations have been further reduced by the so-called donors. Incidentally, one white man who cordinates operations in Lower Zambezi even stole the boat engine which was given for the DNPW boat to ensure there is no working GRZ boat on the Zambezi River. This means that between Chongwe Confluence and Luangwa Confluence, there is no GRZ boat that can do patrols thanks to the sabotage done by the very person who is supposed to empower DNPW. Only OP has a boat. No boat for police, no boat for immigration to patrol the border, no boat for health to provide health services, no boat for DNPW to control poaching and no boat for forestry to check illegal logging and deforestation. How come Zambians don’t know this? This is because all you see are angels in the Zambezi River valley. But these are not angels. Lastly, right now, some “special” people are not searched at Mukamba Gate. The lodge owners and those foreign NGOs operating in the park don’t allow our DNPW officers to search them at entry points to the park.
The mine will stop that as it has capacity to fund DNPW to man these areas and we shall also man the areas under our license.
THE PROBLEM OF ENCROACHMENT
You will hardly hear anyone from government or NGOs talk of the problem of encroachment in the Lower Zambezi National Park. The truth is that there are villages in the park and also mines in the park. The “Wildlife and Protected Area Accounts to Support Nature-based Tourism Technical Report” of 2023 by the Ministry of Finance and National Planning says that there are many farms within Lower Zambezi despite the fact that the Zambia Wildlife Act number 14 of 2015 does not permit agricultural activities in the national parks. The image below shows the problem of encroachment through deforestation and cropping and other land cover changes in the Lower Zambezi National Park between 2010 and 2014. In fact there is worse encorachment that happened after 2014 such that we now have villages 20km into the national park.
- There are many places within the Lower Zambezi National Park where there are illegal villages in the park. People have settled in the park some are 20km inside the park from Mpashya. No one is bothered about this as long as in the valley its business as usual. Encroachment is worse that any mine of 19km square but I can guess that no one has ever brought up that topic because “all I wanna say is that they don’t really care about us”. These villages include Manzi Yozizila, Shikatebeta village and villages around Mwambashi Stream. There is also Chakwenga Village in Chakwenga River area too within the park. People in these villages poach animals with impunity and sell at Chimusanya Market and to commuters. They are also cutting logs for timber and firewood. But the few trees cut when Mwembeshi resources mends a road become topical instead of the daily truckloads leaving the national park. Maybe Zambians just don’t care for trees and animals in this park. Who cursed us? Open your eyes Zambians. These guys are focusing on the money. They know this has never been about trees and animals or the environment but about the control of the economy of the Lower Zambezi National Park itself.
- We spend time talking about Kangaluwi alone because its the only one with the capacity to mininise the hegemony of the white lodge owners in the park. If we were serious about mining in the Lower Zambezi, we would be talking about the activities of ZCCM-IH in the same park and other mines. Yes ZCCM is in the national parl. In Rufunsa and Luangwa, there are places where illegal mines are existing within the Lower Zambezi National Park. These include Kamwesha, Pokela Stream, Chongwe River banks, Kanyele Stream and Chakwenga River. So one mine will kill all animals in LZNP
CONCLUSION
In conclusion, let us reflect. Right now who is stopping deforestation in the park especially along the northern part? No one. Who is stopping fires from reducing number of trees in the park every year? No one. No one wants to spend cash in the bigger part of the park. People just want to milk the park. Let us with the heart and cash fund forestry management, animal restocking in the escarpment and patrols in the areas where patrols stopped since 2002.
Currently our people in Luangwa are worse than when they occupied the area now called Lower Zambezi National Park. Those noisy NGOs and lodge owners only talk about the mine in Lusaka. They cant go to speak to people in Rufunsa and in Luangwa. Our people there get no benefit from tourism and this is why in Luangwa and Rufunsa, our people want mining to be allowed alongside tourism. Only 50 people in the whole Luangwa District are employed in tourism and tourism, according to Mr Tembo the MP for Luangwa, generated only K49,000 to the government in the last year. Therefore, there is only one campaign message for the people of Luangwa and its either you will give them their first industry in form of the mine or you will side with the selfish people who have neglected them for decades. The choice to government is simple.
Kangaluwi Mine will go ahead whether today or in ten or twenty years. The question is do we want to have honest conversations so that the right things are done and the right way of mining is done? Technology for clean, green and clean mine exists. It may not be under this government that one the mining will be done. My hope is that it is done under this government because it is a responsible government. If we wait for a reckless government to come, we shall regret having wasted time over this issue
