02/05/2026
Must read.
LET US NOT ALWAYS BE THE FIRST TO SHOOT OURSELVES. SOMETIMES, A CONVERSATION BY CITIZENS, EVEN WHEN YOU MEAN WELL, CAN DO MORE HARM THAN GOOD.
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If there is one thing that I still do not get, it is how we find it normal in Zambia, to take to social media and join in, and even amplify anything that looks like or sounds like an attack on our own sovereign nation, especially on social media forums and platforms.
Now, do not get me wrong. We must definitely hold ourselves accountable. And I think the reason we need different dissenting voices is that we must have healthy checks and balances on how our nation is running at all times.
But I also know there is a thin line between citizens holding the nation to strict accountability, and citizens joining into an issue with reckless abandon and ending up in a space of public self shaming and public self harming of a country by its own citizens. Correcting a wrong must not be done in a way that ends up being more damaging or destructive, when you look at the bigger picture.
It seems we are yet to understand that every foreigner has a foreign interest. And when they speak, they do so to maximise that interest. And that every Zambian must, therefore, also speak to maximise the Zambian interest first.
Criticism is not a sin. But there is a difference between washing dirty linen at home and hanging it on the highway for every passerby to spit on. One cleans the house. The other devalues it.
When we amplify a negative report about Zambia, or laugh along as foreigners attack our nation, rightly or wrongly, the ones who pays the price is ultimately ourselves and our future generations, Not the foreign commentator. Our young people suffer because that investor who was about to open a factory in Ndola now sees the series of bad facebook posts and comments, they believe it, and they take their money to Rwanda instead.
Genuine patriotism calls us to hold ourselves accountable, but self sabotage is unpatriotic.
Let us debate hard. Let us disagree loudly. But let us never forget that the world is listening. And the world is not neutral.
Let us be the first and the last defenders of the Zambian Flag. No one else will do it for us.