By CHUSA SICHONE –
THE Zambia Land Alliance (ZLA) has appealed to traditional leaders and the Government to get back to the discussion table and address outstanding issues that led to  a failed validation meeting on the proposed National Land Policy (NLP) chaired by Lands Minister Jean Kapata on Wednesday.
House of Chiefs chairperson Chief Ngabwe attributed the action by the 22 chiefs to walk-out to being excluded from the process of formulating the policy.
Ms Kapata informed the chiefs that the draft document was delievered to the House of Chiefs for their input some time ago but was never returned to her ministry.
ZLA board chairperson Emmanuel Mutamba warned that failure to have the NLP will not bring to an end the “chaotic” land allocation in Zambia.
Mr Mutamba said yesterday he had thought that adequate consultation had been done on the policy, but that Wednesday’s action by 22 chiefs to walk out of the meeting indicated that the Government and civil society could have done better.
Mr Mutamba said the chiefs could have been engaged at every stage of the development process, hence the ZLA believed that the traditional rulers had a genuine concern that their views and those of their subjects were not represented in the proposed policy.
“We think that there is need to re-engage the chiefs and it’s also an appeal to the chiefs to get back to the table and we quickly get back and re-negotiate this process so that we get the land process out and we can start doing things properly in land administration,” Mr Mutamba said.
He said Zambia was bigger than everyone and the document was a national agenda hence the need to work collectively in a bid to come up with a policy which was acceptable to all thereby moving the country forward.
Mr Mutamba said that during the re-negotiation process, the participants should identify areas which they felt they could have done better and together come up with amicable solutions.