On September 3, 1978, guerrillas from the Zimbabwe People’s Revolutionary Army shot down a Rhodesian civilian airliner en route to Salisbury (now Harare).
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The guerrillas gathered the handful of survivors on the ground, mostly women and children, and machine-gunned them all, including two small girls of eleven and four. Only a few wounded survivors lived to tell the tale.
The guerrillas were based in Zambia, just across the Zambezi to the north of Rhodesia. Their main camp was at Westland Farm(somewhere in Lusaka West), north of the Zambian capital of Lusaka, and hundreds of miles away from the border.
For the Rhodesians to strike back would mean taking wholesale control of Zambian airspace, and ferrying aircraft and soldiers deep into a hostile country. Needless to say, neither the guerrillas nor the Zambians expected them to do it.
On October 19, 1978, the Rhodesians did it.
Led by a man known only as “Green Leader”,an aerial task force appeared over Lusaka and informed the Zambians that Rhodesia now owned their airspace, and would continue to do so until the Rhodesian assault on the guerrilla camp at Westland Farm was through.
The ultimatum delivered by Green Leader to the Lusaka tower is a classic, as is the exchange between the shocked Zambians and the Rhodesian commander. (Snippet of the actual exchange in the video in the first tweet).
Toward the end of the sortie, a Kenya Airlines captain awaiting clearance to land asked in confusion: “Who has priority here anyway?” The reply from the Zambian traffic controller: “Well, I think the Rhodesians do at this time.”
“No revenge,” said a Zambian taxi driver. “They bomb us and raid us but we say, `No revenge.’ President Kaunda says we are not strong enough.” There was no hint of his own feelings and he abruptly changed the subject.
For President Kenneth D. Kaunda, the raids brought the realities of war to his doorstep. They revealed the inadequacy of Zambia's defense system, which $20 million in new British equipment will only partly rectify.
KK then took a more forceful line. He said he was diverting Government funds from badly‐needed development projects to purchase new arms—a move to assuage public fears and also to soothe the feelings of army officers, angry at not being allowed to strike back at the attackers.
President Kaunda was walking through a minefield of explosive feelings among Zambians and could only caution that retaliatory strikes would be “committing suicide.”
ON April 27, 1982, Webster Lumbwe, 31 years old, a former Zambian intelligence agent, was sentenced to 20 years in prison after his conviction on charges of spying for the United States Central Intelligence Agency. (C.I.A.)
In the 1970s and 1980s Lusaka was the espionage center of Southern Africa and at one stage the Ambassadors of the USA and USSR were high ranking spies.
Webster Lumbwe joined the Zambia Security Intelligence Service as an intelligence officer in February 1971 at the age of twenty years. Sometime in May or June 1976, he attended an External Operations Course organized by the C.I.A.
ZAMBIA's JET FIGHTER HERO AND HIS BRILLIANT ESCAPE AGAINST RHODESIAN FORCES
Lieutenant General Peter D. Zuze
Lt. Gen. Peter Dingiswayo Zuze (born 18 December 1942) is a former Zambian Air Force (ZAF) (then Zambia National Defence Force) Commander and diplomat. He was commander during the period of liberation struggle of Southern Africa.
Zuze was born on 18 December 1942 from Joseph and Anna Zuze in Malopa Village in Chief Lwembe's area in Petauke District. He was brought up by his sister Elizabeth in Kabwe where she was married.
noun
a type of language consisting of words and phrases that are regarded as very informal, are more common in speech than writing, and are typically restricted to a particular context or group of people.
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You will find here a list of uniquely Zambian English words and phrases. The language is constantly evolving and changing so I will share some of the phrases in use. Please feel free to leave your contributions in the comments
Album - (Offensive Term)Refers to Pregnancy/Birth – That girl just released an Album.
Ati how? - How are you? Very informal slang. Origin ‘Ati bwanji’ became ‘ati bwa’ and ‘bwa’ was translated to English ‘how’
Mrs Kapelwa Mwanangúmbi Sikota – First Zambian Registered Nurse
The first Zambian Registered nurse of any gender was Mrs Kapelwa Mwanang’umbi Sikota.
Born in Mongu District on 7th July 1928. She obtained her primary school education at Lukona Mission and Mabumbu Girls Boarding schools in Western Province after which she proceeded to Chipembi Girls Boarding School for her Standard VI.
1997 COUP D'ÉTAT ATTEMPT IN ZAMBIA
28 OCTOBER 1997
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On the morning of 28 October 1997, Zambians woke to a man calling himself Captain Solo announcing on the state radio that he had taken over the country, was dismissing the chiefs of the army and the police.
He gave President Frederick T. J. Chiluba until 9 A.M. to surrender or be killed.
I just discovered we had a shipping company. From the little information I have manged to come by, the company was incorporated on 14 November 1988. It is now dissolved
The ship in the picture (photograph by Joerg Seyler captured on 8 February 1992) was a cargo ship given the name Manchinchi Bridge before it changed ownership.
The ship was build in 1978 by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd at their shipyard in Shimonoseki, Japan