How Do We Fight Climate Change in Zambia?

A woman crossing a canal in the Barotse Sub-Basin

By Birbal Boniface Musoba

10 July, 2015

Sinking back into the seat behind her desk, her eyes were alert again as if consciously summoning back the animated images she was about to recount.

“A couple of months ago when we were in Sesheke on a World Bank Mission, I vividly recall the narration by one Mutemwa community member of how she was almost killed by a crocodile that very morning before we arrived,” She continued, her speech steady, her gaze intent. “The shocking part of the story was the calmness with which the woman narrated her story, as if that was a normal occurrence, a part of their daily lives.”

Chama Nambeya speaking during World Press Freedom Day

The woman speaking was ChamaNambeya, the Communication and Administration Manager at the Interim ClimateChange Secretariat (ICCS). She was narrating a story she heard when she was part of the third World Bank Implementation Support Mission tour from 23^rd March to 3^rd April, 2015.

“For me, what was really sad about that story,” Ms. Nambeya continued, “was that, even though the people of Mutemwa live so close to the Zambezi River, they still do not have adequate and safe access to water. For them, accessing water is still at great danger.”

This account was part of many first-hand but eerily similar lamentations by the locals living in the Barotse Sub-basin of the hardships they faced that the Mission team heard recounted over and over again during the Mission.

Leaning forward on her table littered with documents, files, folders, the ICCS-issued laptop and her iPhone, as if to make sure no word was missed, her eyes fervent, yet steadfast, the Communication and Administration Manager, who was celebrating her one year anniversary working for the ICCS, stated, “being part of the ICCS’s overseeing the Pilot Programme for Climate Resilience implementation in Zambia and seeing people’s lives transformed for the better through this programme, makes me happy and makes me sleep well at night.”

It is said that the difference between success and failure is a great team. And the ICCS’s 11 person team, with a tightknit support staff, evinces the diligence and fortitude in executing the Secretariat’s agenda that gives credence to the realisation that in any organisation, regardless of the size, the workforce is the most valuable asset.

“The thing I love about my job is that it’s a new and growing field, and it’s interesting to be in the forefront of the pioneering efforts,” David C. Kaluba said of his job at the ICCS. “It’s exciting to establish an institution with the members of staff implementing the programmes of various projects, as I lead them into something that they find exciting.”

The enthusiasm and elation reverberating in Mr. Kaluba’s voice as he speaks, carrying undertones of fervour, eagerness and vigour, are reminiscent of a young computer techie on the cusp of coding a multibillion dollar string of code that will revolutionise information technology in some way, or a savant about to ponder the reasoning to finding answers to the big questions in life.

David C. Kaluba during the 2014 World Bank Mission

Sitting in front of him and hearing him speak about climate change and climate resilience in Zambia, and how it makes him look forward to the next day as another opportunity to do something different and affect change in the world, Mr. Kaluba, who happens to be the National Coordinator of the ICCS, the head honcho himself, infuses everything and everyone around him with the impassioned vest to roll up one’s sleeves and get down and dirty to affect the change needed in combating climate change.

It is this gravitas and vigour that sets the trail ablaze for the ICCS team.

However, he is the first to admit that he does not do it all by himself. In ensuring that his vision for the ICCS is well executed, Mr. Kaluba has surrounded himself with a team that ensures that the ICCS effectually facilitates its mandate through the coordination of climate change activities by bringing together stakeholders like government, private sector, civil society and cooperating partners in achieving the aims and objectives of the National Climate Change Response Strategy; and, the forthcoming Climate Change Policy.

For the National Coordinator, this means that each staff member brings years of experience to their position, thus, ensuring the functional and proficient implementation of the strategies that have been developed on raising awareness on climate change and its related impacts and resilience efforts at the national, province, district, sub-district and community level, including the targeted beneficiaries in the Barotse and Kafue Sub-Basins.

“I recently just got back from doing field work in Mwandi and Kanzugula,” Carol Zulu explained as she tried to illustrate the dynamic nature of the job at the ICCS that requires each team member to be at the height of their mental prowess. “In the communities that we visited, we were looking at three projects of the excavation of ponds as a solution to the difficulties faced by these communities with water supply.”

Mrs. Zulu, the ICCS’s Environmental and Social Inclusion Manager, describes her position as having two components: the environmental aspect that ensures that all projects implemented under PPCR do not exert or create negative impacts on the environment and the communities, and the social aspect which ensures that no community member is left behind during the projects’ implementation process. This means taking into account the women, orphans and the vulnerable of the community and placing them smack in the centre of the hive of activities.

She explained that for these particular projects with the proposal of dealing with intact areas of land where dams had never been built before, the Zambia Environmental Management Agency raised concerns of the negative consequences on the environment that the projects would foster.

“This happens sometimes,” she narrated, that twinkle of excitement returning to her eyes: she’s one of those who loves her job. “So, every time you are faced with a different environmental setting and different community arrangement, in each instance you’ll have to look for what has to be done specifically for that environment or community that is different from any other environment or community.”

Her enthusiasm lingers in the room long after the interview has ended.

When you have a conversation with the rest of the ICCS’s team, the abundantly clear resurgence of the same qualities and traits in each member of the team is beyond undeniable, it’s uncanny; from the fervour, eagerness and vigour one experiences when around Mr. Kaluba, to Ms. Nambeya’s steadfastness, to the twinkle of excitement in Mrs. Zulu’s eye.

This rest of the team consists of the Financial Management Specialist, Participatory Adaptation Specialist, Climate Mitigation Coordinator, Monitoring & Evaluation Specialist, Procurement Manager, Project Accountant, Monitoring & Evaluation Assistant, and the Office Manager. 

And, all of them, in their own regard, deserving of an article extolling the virtues they bring to the ICCS, ensuring that the organisation that was established in 2012 and housed under the Ministry of Finance, is Zambia’s foremost national coordinating body for all climate change-related activities!

Find out more about the Zambia's mitigating and adaptation efforts in combating climate change by visiting the ICCS's website, Facebook and Twitter pages and expressing yourself on how climate change affects your part of the world!

Don't hesitate to contact me here for more information.

Community members clear a canal as part of PPCR implementation in the Barotse Sub-Basin

Ghetto Dreams - The Sequel

It all started with the stain of a single drop of blood in a half-empty bathtub.

You know what? I’m getting way ahead of myself; let me back up a few short years so as to give you the whole, unadulterated picture.

Its 1985, Nelson Mandela rejects an offer of freedom from the ‘South African’ ‘government’; blood tests for AIDS are approved; a volcanic eruption in Columbia kills 25,000 people; VH-1 makes its broadcasting debut; 59 people die as Egyptian forces storm a plane on Malta; and, Live Aid, a 17 hour rock concert broadcasts worldwide from London and Philadelphia, raising $70 million for starving Africans.

You know what? I don’t really need to go that far back, let me fast forward to the juicy parts.

I had never thought I’d ever be in this position, in this place, in this moment in time – I mean thinking about it is one thing, but the sobering reality of the cold slice of the blade, the warmth of the oozing blood, the staining of the clear cold water in the half-filled bathtub, is a magical sight; it’s something to behold as it is both mesmerising and captivating, and, in the right light, it adds the colour otherwise missing from most mundane lives.

In that moment, in that instance, everything was clear and everything made sense – I realised why it is life itself.

To fully appreciate this moment, you need to realise that I was never keen on living, but do not mistake this as meaning that the eternal release into the hereafter was an option either. Being raised a Catholic by loving parents who went far and beyond their civil service paychecks to provide a lap of luxury that left me needing for nothing but wanting for more, instilled in me a strong sense of the foreboding as I was reminded on a daily basis that my actions, whose consequences apparently yielded the comfort and luxury I’d enjoy beyond the things that my hands can touch, were being closely watched by an ever present Omniscience and a multitude of witnesses with nothing better to do with their eternal bliss but watch little boys take baths – and people judge the catholic priests, and to them I say, “cast the first fucking stone!”

Therefore, this wholeness I feel in my heart – this transcending peace – was not arrived at lightly.

However, if you understood my birth, you’d understand that I never wanted this life that I’m living but made the best out of the many great opportunities handed to me on a silver platter. Even Nature itself could not force this life on me and, therefore, Science had to intervene and prevail where Nature failed.

Ah that Science, the stain that has polluted and raped my land long before lubricant was ever invented; our saviour, our messiah; our very own personal Jesus.

But who said we needed saving? Maybe, just maybe, we were fine before You showed up.

But, alas, Science saved me where Nature failed me. Nature, what a fucking joke! You give us everything but You gave us nothing. Because for ten months You tried to push me out and for ten months I refused to be moved. For ten months my parents joyfully awaited my arrival but for ten months I was the disappointment that I would become. For ten months, for ten whole months, I stood my ground. Because in those ten months, I was a man and as a man I stood firm. For the first ten months before my life started, I was a man. Even before I took my first breath I knew how it felt to smoke a cigarette next to a spent beautiful woman whose name I will never remember.

Now that you know the context, let’s proceed with the story.

Getting out of the bathtub felt effortless. Maybe it was because I was being carried out of it. Or maybe it was because for the first time in my life I had allowed someone else to be strong for me, to help me where I had failed to succeed, to lead me beyond the path that I saw before me.

Standing besides the empty bathtub I realised that even the toughest stain can be removed with time.

Standing besides the empty bathtub, I realised that she wasn’t breathing anymore. She had died before I could help her, before I could reach her, before I could tell her that I loved her, and now all I have is time but she isn’t here to hear all the things I have hidden from this world in our special place. 

Living feels like an eternity without someone to love you.

So I let go.

THE END

This Blog was first published on LM squared on Tuesday, 8^th October, 2013 when I was featured as a guest blogger. Check them out, they are two people who love to experience life and write unlimited, uncensored expression of all its pleasures that inspire you beyond belief.

This article has been reedited from its original form to better capture this blog’s new feel. The Original article can be found in its originally published and unedited form here.

This is My Kingdom Come

By Birbal Boniface Musoba

In recent years, I have found myself in a position that I've always dreamed about: working, in one form or the other, in the writing field, as I pursue my own writing ambitions. When I was a youngling, I dreamed of spending my days writing brilliance and my evening musing of the brilliance of the world with equally talented and tormented souls, whilst equally making a living from this pursuit.

When I woke up this morning, I realised that this was exactly the life that I was living. Granted, my reality is still very far from the glamour of sipping cognac with my legs crossed, seated across from Cormac McCarthy and Gillian Flynn and Marcus Sakey, as we unearth the truths behind the meaning of existence and love and life and death and everything in-between.

Even as that future draws closer to my reality, my present state is not so bad. I seat across great minds like Chris Zumani Zimba and Robin Tyson, and work on the brilliant writings of authors’ whose works will challenge the status quo of the principles our very nation Zambia is founded on, whilst working on my first novel. I muse and challenge my writing and explore my conscious and push what is called Zambian literature and Zambian English. And to top it all off, I get paid for doing just this.

But of late, I have found myself filled with a certain sense of dread, such that I constantly wake up in a sweat, in a fit, in a state of rage that I am not doing enough; but enough of what? My bones ache that I'm not taking too many risks, that I'm not pushing the boundaries further out enough, that I'm not utilising all that is laid bare in front of me. Why this sudden trepidation, this anxiety, this restlessness? Wasn’t this what I wanted, desired, fought four, sacrificed and bleed for?

But I guess that that is human endeavour personified. When we reach that plateau we thought was the apex of our existence, we realise that there remains more to be discovered, more to be explored, more to be conquered, more to be achieved and subdued. That yearning, that desire for more is what makes us the most dominant species on the planet and what ensures that we discover more, explore more and add more to the human condition, until that moment when our lives have attained that meaning that we can live behind and be remembered for that we lived, that we existed, that we mattered!

My name is Birbal Boniface Musoba and I am eager and willing and ready to add to the human condition and I will not be satisfied until I exhaust to the fullest the potential that drives me to be… your turn.