By Susan Mwape
Despite having 750,000 square kilometers, Zambia still faces a number of issues on land disparities. Land is an important factor in the development of any country; it is a resource for investment, income generation, food production, source of power and most of all shelter.
Most Zambians are insecure on their land because they do not own it; most times they are evicted and even denied of access to land because of the bureaucratic systems placed in land administration. Land is considered to be for the elite because of unfair land allocation especially to the poor. In order to access land one needs to be very persistent failure to which one may be unable to access land. In other cases political affiliation places one at an advantage because it becomes easier to access land.
Land is easily allocated to foreigners and yet citizens have sleepless nights to access land, despite the importance of land in the development of Zambia a major concern is that of lack of issue based campaign by leading political parties towards the general elections. There has been very little said about key development issues in this year’s campaign promises, political parties have rarely told the nation how they intend to address land issues once they are elected into power.
Land distribution by chiefs is another concern, the currently land policy leaves the matter of customary land distribution too loosely. Customary land is supposed to belong to the community and should be administered by chiefs; this isn’t the case because now in most instances investors are getting vast portions of customary land because it’s easier to get land from the chiefs than from the City Council. Acquisition of land compliments poverty alleviation and therefore there is need to quickly revise the current land policy in Zambia.
The use of land as a fraud engine makes development a painfully slow process and if there is to be development in Zambia then the land policy especially section 3 that vests too much power in the republican president needs to be revisited. Leasing government Markets to investors for 65 years does not make the land policy any better because this is detrimental to the development of the country. Instead of leasing land to all this makeshift investors it is better to let the Zambians then invest and try to develop their own country on their own.
Despite having 750,000 square kilometers, Zambia still faces a number of issues on land disparities. Land is an important factor in the development of any country; it is a resource for investment, income generation, food production, source of power and most of all shelter.
Most Zambians are insecure on their land because they do not own it; most times they are evicted and even denied of access to land because of the bureaucratic systems placed in land administration. Land is considered to be for the elite because of unfair land allocation especially to the poor. In order to access land one needs to be very persistent failure to which one may be unable to access land. In other cases political affiliation places one at an advantage because it becomes easier to access land.
Land is easily allocated to foreigners and yet citizens have sleepless nights to access land, despite the importance of land in the development of Zambia a major concern is that of lack of issue based campaign by leading political parties towards the general elections. There has been very little said about key development issues in this year’s campaign promises, political parties have rarely told the nation how they intend to address land issues once they are elected into power.
Land distribution by chiefs is another concern, the currently land policy leaves the matter of customary land distribution too loosely. Customary land is supposed to belong to the community and should be administered by chiefs; this isn’t the case because now in most instances investors are getting vast portions of customary land because it’s easier to get land from the chiefs than from the City Council. Acquisition of land compliments poverty alleviation and therefore there is need to quickly revise the current land policy in Zambia.
The use of land as a fraud engine makes development a painfully slow process and if there is to be development in Zambia then the land policy especially section 3 that vests too much power in the republican president needs to be revisited. Leasing government Markets to investors for 65 years does not make the land policy any better because this is detrimental to the development of the country. Instead of leasing land to all this makeshift investors it is better to let the Zambians then invest and try to develop their own country on their own.
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