People of the Kafue Flats

Interview with Chief Mwanachingwala

Honourable Chief Mwanachingwala, what is your actual name and when did you become Chief Mwanachingwala?
My name is Charles Malambo and I was born in 1945. I was inaugurated Chief Mwanachingwala on 18th July 1999although I had been acting as chief from 1995 when my uncle, who was the previous chief died. 

How old is the Mwanachingwala chiefdom?
The chiefdom started in the 1800s and the first Chief Mwanachingwala died in 1917

How many people live in your chiefdom?
There are more than 70,000 inhabitants in my chiefdom

What were you doing before you were made chief?
I am a diesel mechanic by training. I first worked for Zambia Railways as a locomotive driver beginning 1963. I then studied mechanical engineering, first at the university of Dar es salaam and then Peking university in China where I concentrated on Locomotive mechanics engineering. I also went to Michigan State University in the US under the General Electric Company (GE) where I studied Diesel Mechanics.

I retired from Zambia Railways in 1974 to become a farmer and a cattle rancher. This is what I was doing until my family called me in 1995 to assume the responsibility of becoming chief Mwanachingwala.

How did you get involved with WWF?
WWF has been interested in working in our wetland area for a long time, in-fact dating back to the 60s when they bought Lochinvar National Park on behalf of the Zambian government from a private rancher.

But more recently WWF has brought a wetlands restoration project here that has involved my people in a very direct way. We are learning how to utilize our wetlands resources wisely, and we are being positioned to begin deriving direct benefits from wetlands products such as tourism in our area.

You are the Board-chair of the Mwanachingwala Area Conservation Authority. What does this mean for you and your people?
It means just what has been demonstrated so far; we have a conservancy of which we are full participants, translocation of animals has already started and my people can visually appreciate what they stand to benefit from a fully fledged conservancy. I am very confident that our future generations will benefit very significantly from the efforts we are sowing today.

For my people, this is an unbelievable development because we were displaced from our land during the two great wars in 1914 and 1945. The memories of deprivation still linger in the minds of the elderly folk who went through those ordeals and are still with us. To get some value added to whatever is left of our land is therefore very gratifying.

How else are you involved in this project and are there any other benefits?
Some of our people have received training to become village scouts in the conservancy. Our cattle can also still graze in the area and we have received some assistance to build dip-tanks in order to protect our domestic animals from disease.

So how do you see the future of all these developments?
I have tasked myself with the responsibility of ensuring that my people get fully involved in this project. We want to see more species return to our area and we want visitors to start flocking here. I think the future looks very promising and we are eager to learn more about how we can look after our wetlands better.