Dear Editor,
The mood in Chingola in the past few days has been very bright! You can actually feel the hype of economic activities at play!
MoMo booths, furniture shops, boutiques, grocery shops, Ku green market konse the wheels of the economy have really turned in their favour.
This reminds me of the times when miners and contractors used to have their fair share of our mining proceeds in terms of businesses and remunerations of employees, Chingola used to be alive.
This hype in the economy of Chingola is as a result of the redundancy packages the miners have started receiving, and before long the hype will die out when the miners are all spent!
If only our KCM could go back to its old ways of conducting business by fairly giving business to the locals on merit and also employing on merit, Chingola would be alive again.
When local contractors are given a fair share of business opportunities by the mines, they pump back into their communities and in turn empower other local businesses like saloons, barbershops, marketeers, boiler makers and so on through the trickledown effect.
Now that Copper is fetching around $9,000 per tonne, Chingola and the Copperbelt should have been the most economically happening place right now.
In this same vein, l would also like to take the opportunity to make an appeal to the Sports Ministry of Government and KCM through Provisional Liquidator Milingo Lungu who is running KCM on their behalf, that may you please adopt the sports and arts facilities in Chingola (Racquets club, crickets, bowling, swimming pool, mine club, Chingola arts theatre, Lulamba sports complex, Vestra etc) and pump in funds to revive the sports and arts industry in Chingola?
That’s a big industry just sleeping in Chingola and their supporting facilities getting dilapidated by the day.
Sports and arts do not only bring people together and entertain; they are also a source of positive recreation, a source of revenue for our communities while also creating meaningful employment for the locals.
I am willing and ready to be a voluntary patron to see to it that these facilities are up and running and start pumping back to the economy of our communities and the country at large.
Luckily we already have the facilities, all they need are renovations and some bit of facelifts for them to be up and running to capacity. Chingola is a sports and arts hub and when the facilities are up and running we could also be hosting international events right here, and that’s revenue which could change the face of Chingola for the better!
I hope and pray this sincere appeal reaches the relevant recipients.
Arthur Teleshi
Nchanga NDC aspiring candidate
