Kantanshi Independent member of parliament Anthony Mumba says the National Dialogue Forum (NDF) is debating whether or not the Constitutional Court and the Supreme Court should be merged.

In an interview, Mumba said interesting conversations had come out during the forum.

“Let me start by commending government for coming up with this initiative. It’s a well know fact that the constitution has caused some challenges and this initiative by government, though unfortunately not being supported as it should be supported especially by political players, I think it’s unfortunate. I think the UPND need to realise that the realize that the representation that they have is equally very important to the governance of our country and therefore should not be taken for granted. This exercise where we are debating contentious issues for example we are just from discussing the Constitutional Court and the Supreme Court being merged. And very interesting conversations have come out. And for m as member of parliament I have learnt one or two things,” Mumba said.

“And I think this exercise will also help us to explain to our people what is in the constitution and what people should be looking out for. A lot of issues are coming out which are highly enriching out in terms of knowledge. So it’s unfortunate that colleagues from the UPND most of them have shunned. And I would like to commend those that have taken the responsibility to be part of this important forum.”

Meanwhile, Mumba appealed to government to quickly resolve the tax dispute with the mines in order to save jobs.

“I think that the happenings on the Copperbelt particularly the KCM situation, I mean I am coming from a constituency where the main operations of Mopani Copper Mines lie in Kantanshi constituency and I have been following closely some of the arguments which the Mines are putting across. Of course the issue of the copper price which mostly is used as a reason as to why probably jobs are being lost and so on is not the case. So it’s more to do with the operations, it’s more to do with the taxation systems that they have been talking about. So I think that government needs to quickly move in to ensure that a wrong precedence is not set. Remember there are mining activities in North Western and also on the Copperbelt. So if such a similar turn of events is being followed by other Mines you can imagine how disastrous the Copperbelt will be,” said Mumba.