Sean Tembo advises UPND not to dissolve parastatals boards if they are not ready to appoint new ones
Written by Mafken FM Newsroom on 4 October 2021
Economic Progress (PeP)President Sean Tembo has said that President Hakainde Hichilema and his United Party for National Development (UPND) administration should stop dissolving boards of parastatals if they are not ready to appoint their replacements.
Mr Tembo said that his party is deeply concerned with the pattern being exhibited by the UPND administration whereby they dissolve boards of parastatal organizations without replacing them, thereby creating a vacuum for these institutions, adding that, by law, in order for any parastatal body to function it needs to have a Board of Directors in place.
Mr Tembo said, therefore, whenever Government in its capacity as sole shareholder for these parastatal bodies, decides to dissolve a board, they should be ready to immediately appoint a new board.
In a statement, he said If the UPND administration does not have anyone in mind to appoint to boards, then they should allow the old boards to continue operating and only dissolve them at such a time that they have identified people to appoint to a new board.
Mr Tembo said”Otherwise parastatals whose boards have been dissolved but not replaced are currently at a standstill and this is adversely affecting the economy.
“The UPND Administration should be cognizant of the fact that Government and its parastatals are the biggest player in our economy.
Therefore anything that puts the operations of parastatal bodies at a standstill will inevitably affect the entire economy,” he said.
As Patriots for Economic Progress, Mr Tembo said, we would also like to take this opportunity to advise the UPND administration to consider retaining some of the old members of parastatal boards when the time comes to appoint new boards. This will ensure the retention of institutional memory and will likely make the boards more effective by combining the old with the new.
