RSZ run down

By Chali Mulenga

Zambia Railway board chairman Solomon Muzyamba has welcomed President Michael Sata’s directive to newly appointed minister of Justice Wynter Kabimba to examine the freight and passenger concession agreement involving the Government, Railway Systems of Zambia (RSZ) which was signed in 2003 as it is loaded against the Zambia.

 Speaking in Livingstone, he said that the directive by the president was long overdue and it is for the good of the country.

 He said the board had made are recommendation to its line ministry that the Government should repossess the company if it does want the concession agreement to reviewed.

  He said that the concession had a lot of areas in the concession that should have been reviewed are not for the good of the country.

 “If we allow RSZ to continue to operate without any amendments to the concession agreement, we would have no railway line left or to talk about,” he said.

 “If we cannot agree to have some changes to the concession agreement then we need to have railway line back,” he said.

Who is also a lawyer in Livingstone, Mr Muzyamba called on the people in the country to support the decision that the president had made on RSZ and called for more political will the matter.

He said that railway line was now a night mare as the support from the people to undo the agreement.

He said that no lawyer worth his salt would advise their client to sign such an agreement.

 “It is like the government of Zambia had no legal adviser before signing of the concession agreement as the agreement has no exit clause,” he said.

Mr Muzyamba said the team must have been very unfair to client Zambia as it was badly drafted.

 The chairperson said the best option for the country is have ultra cancellation of the at the concession agreement to the save the railway infrastructure in the country.

He said that if not it must re-negotiated so that there is an agreement that would let them to plough back into the country so that they can maintain the railway infrastructure.

Mr Muzyamba said all the railway infrastructure that had been given to the RSZ had been run down by the company.

“In Pemba, Lusaka, Kafue, the sheds in these districts have been exposed to extreme vandalism as Kafue has equipment for the repair of tracks,” he said.

He said that it is sad that most the high tech equipment and machinery that the ZR had given to RSZ had been run down.

 “The disuse of the equipment that costs million of US $ had vandalised and the land that had reserved had been encroached adding that expensive infrastructure had been on the land as it would difficult to get back,” he said.

Mr Muzyamba said there is need to prescribe the minimum speed for the train as its current speed of the train is to slow it is 30 kilometres per hour and it used to be 120 kilometres for the passenger train whilst the good train is at 40 kilometres per hour whilst it used to be 90 kilometres.

He said that RSZ’s interest is in the good freight and in the passenger freight and that Zambia people that want to use the train spend the whole week on the railway.

He said that frequency of the passenger had reduced and that its efficiency as the passenger going up to the Copperbelt province from southern province had to spend night at railway station in Lusaka to wait for the connecting train to the Copperbelt.   

Mr Muzyamba said that the condition of the poor railway infrastructure had contributed to the slow pass of the train was moving at the current speed.

“As as a result of the current state of the railway infrastructure which has been run down the trains have to move at slow pass,” he said.

He said that the trains were operating without proper lighting and there are no signals at railway crossing.

He said that all the gods that was  supposed to be on the railway line had now gone to the road as it was on the road thus reducing the life span of the road like the copper and cobalt from the mines.

 End