Re-appointment of Dora Siliya and the Office of Attorney General

I have been waiting for the dust to settle before making a comment on the events surrounding the re-appointment of Ms. Dora Siliya as Minister in the Cabinet of President Rupiah Banda.

A recap is in order. Ms. Siliya had been accused of breaching the Ministerial code of practice in three cases: awarding a tender to RP Capital the Value the assets of Zamtel without following laid down procedures, irregularities in the award of the tender to supply a new radar system at the Lusaka International Airport and finally misuse of Constituency development funds. A tribunal consisting of eminent Supreme Court judges concluded that she did breach the code by not following the advice of the Attorney General in awarding the RP Capital Tender. Ms. Siliya subsequently resigned from her position (while the President was digesting the report) and appealed the tribunal’s decision via a judicial review in the High Court. It is worth noting that she was allowed to remain in her Ministerial House and maintain her official government vehicle even after resigning from her position.

A few weeks ago, Judge Philip Musonda ruled in Ms. Siliya’s favour by stating that the tribunal overstated its mandate by bring up the issue of ignoring the advice from the Attorney General. The President swiftly (no need to take time and study the report this time) re-appointed Dora to Cabinet as Minister of Education.

I would be the first one to admit that I lack the necessary legal background to comment on this case. However, I will try and approach the matter from a common sense and good governance angle.

This case has huge implications on the office of the Attorney General. The Constitution of the Republic of Zambia provided for this important office to offer advice to government officials (political and civil) on legal matters. Why? Because it was recognised that people discharging government functions may not have the necessary legal background to execute certain transactions. The Attorney General chambers therefore provide a legal advice service to all government departments. It therefore beggars belief that a politician would act on behalf of the government contrary to legal advice provided by both the Attorney General and Solicitor General. Dora admitted during the tribunal hearings that she did not understand the advice given by the Attorney General but instead of seeking clarification, she went ahead and signed the deal. How does the country protect itself against rogue politicians and civil servant signing agreements that disadvantage the country and then plead ignorance of the law?

There is an interesting example in the UK that demonstrates the importance of the office of the Attorney General. When the UK government was contemplating joining the US in the invasion of Iraq (2003), the then Prime Minister (Tony Blair) sought the advice of the Attorney General (Lord Goldsmith) on the legality of such action. It is alleged that his initial advice was that the legal basis was weak but this was firmed up following a trip to the US. Opponents of the Iraq war have fought hard to have access to the document detailing the initial advice as they believe it would prove that Tony Blair tried to act against the advice of the Attorney General. If this document had been made public at the time and had it proven that Tony Blair acted against the Attorney General’s advice (or even manipulated the Attorney General to provide favourable advice), I have no doubt in my mind that he would have had to resign.

Our politics have such low standards that the President saw nothing wrong in re-appointing Ms. Siliya. In doing so, he is sending a message to the rest of Government that the office of Attorney General is irrelevant. A more prudent approach would have been to allow Dora to spend sometime on the backbenches before being re-appointed if the President felt she was a very talented individual despite not knowing the meaning of the word nullity.

The PANEL.

Hearses revisited

Sylvia Masebo yesterday presented her defence in the hearsegate scandal.

She presented a clear timeline of events leading to the purchase of the vehicles which clearly implied that the current Minister of Local Government, Benny Tetamashimba was aware of this purchase. Tetamashimba attended meetings between May 27 to May 30 last year at which a decision was made to buy the hearses among other things in his capacity as deputy Minister. The Hon. Minister is either incompetent or is not telling us the whole truth about his involvement in this issue. It also goes to show how inefficient our government (political) and civil service are if it requires a former Minister to clarify matters on such an issue. One would think the Permanent secretary or even the Minister would have tasked one of the civil servants to go through the records to find out the chain of events leading to the purchase of the infamous motors. We therefore can only conclude that Tetamashimba and the President are being vindictive and are merely trying to use this matter to ‘teach’ Masebo a lesson for supporting Magande in the race to become the MMD presidential candidate last year.

Hon. Masebo’s statement has provided us with the answer to HOW these hearses were purchased. We now require is a similar account to WHY the purchase was made and if there was any CORRUPTION in the transaction. Tetamashimba has reported Masebo to the Anti-Corruption Commission and we hope this would help answer the corruption question but most Zambia are still amazed that a committee of intelligent men and women thought spending scare resources on 100 hearse at a cost of $290000 was a good idea. Why not 100 ambulances or spend $290000 to improve 100 rural health centres. The same meeting decided to purchase 30 tractors to be used in garbage collection. Had they decided to purchase 130 tractors and no hearses, there would be no story because everybody can see the mountains of rubbish surrounding our towns.

The PANEL