Judicial and Allied Workers Union of Zambia (JAWUZ) Peter Mwale says the scramble for positions in the recently advertised police recruitment shows that government has not created jobs in the country.

And Peter has observed that the recruitment process for Zambia Police officers is marred by corruption and that the whole process is based on tribe, region, and nepotism among other corrupt practices.

Speaking to News Diggers in an interview, Mwale expressed worry at the rate that application letters were flowing into the Zambia Police Service from youths who wanted to be employed.

He added that the Patriotic Front government was far from meeting the job creation that it promised and encouraged the Ministry of Finance to prioritise job creation in the next budget.

“The recruitment process is marred by corruption itself. It is good that the advert is there in public domain but the process of recruitment in the Zambia police, it’s biased in most cases. So for us, we strongly feel that this recruitment process is just academic. We may already have people who have been picked and that creates a problem. Yes we are seeing the adverts coming up but the process needs be sincere and honest. Let those who deserve to be picked and become police officers be picked. They should not employ political cadres in the police service, policemen are public servants and they are supposed to be picked on merit. There should be no favouritism, no tribalism and we want those that are charged with the responsibility to employ these police officers to pick people on merit,” he said.

“We know that most recruitments in the police service is biased and marred by corruption and favouritism. So let the process be fair and there will be no problem if that happens. I think we are sick and tired of seeing the recruitment process in the police service which is marred by tribalism, corruption, nepotism, we don’t want that. All the people that have applied, let them be picked on merit and let it be open, because if it is not open, that will create more problems and people will then feel that only those who are connected are the ones who are employed. We want to see job creation which is transparent, sincere and honest and we can only see this if people that are going to be picked are on merit.”

Mwale said the influx of letters received in various provinces by the service for new recruits showed that the government was far from meeting the job deficit.

“To me, this shows that government should do more in terms of job creation. That is a sign and if politicians in this country are genuine, especially those that are running government, that is an indication that in terms of job creation, they are far from it. What we want to see are more job adverts even in the Zambia Army, in the Zambia Air Force and the Zambia National Service. All the security wings if they can say they are going to create about 10 thousand jobs in the defense force, I think that can solve a lot of problems for us. We are not doing much in terms of job creation in Zambia, and our appeal now is to those in government that let them work hard and do the best for the unemployed youths in tis country. Job creation is something that we want, if you can see that the number of applications and the number of positions that are being created in the police, it just shows you that in terms of job creation in Zambia, we are far from it,” said Mwale.