… it’s not the senior govt officials who will suffer but rural dwellers
By Chinoyi Chipulu
The United States government yesterday announced that it is cutting K1.4 billion in annual aid provided to Zambia for medications and medical supplies for the Zambian government’s failure to stop the systematic theft of donated drugs.
And US Ambassador to Zambia Michael Gonzales shed tears after announcing K1.4 billion cut towards Zambia’s medical supplies because he felt the people who would suffer more from this decision were those in rural areas.
Critical drugs that have been affected by this decision include HIV, malaria, and tuberculosis (TB).
The US has provided approximately US $128 million annually, which is close to K3.5 billion to buy medications to treat HIV, malaria and tuberculosis, as well as to provide technical and operational support for Zambia’s national health supply chain.
“I have cried over this because it’s not the senior government officials who will be affected. It’s the poor people in rural areas,” Ambassador Gonzales said while wiping off tears.
He disclosed that he had held 33 meetings with senior government officials to request for action to stop further thefts and bring culprits to justice but the government’s actions had fallen drastically short of demonstrating a commitment to safeguarding the U.S assistance.
Ambassador Gonzales said for more than a year, the government of the United States had requested tangible actions from the government of Zambia to respond to the countrywide systematic theft of those products provided by the US. He said in the face of minimal action by the government of Zambia, the US was taking necessary steps to safeguard and ensure the accountability of American taxpayer funds. He said he had zero doubt that this was an organised criminal endeavor that included fairly senior people.
“I stressed, I pleaded with the government, don’t just go into a random shipping container that is selling commodities, don’t just find something that is stolen, and arrest the 15-year-old kid behind the counter. Because I guarantee you, that kid didn’t buy the medication, maybe doesn’t even know where it came from. So use this like a reasonable, organised law enforcement investigation to find where are stolen medicines being sold from. Who owns those pharmacies? Call them in,” Gonzales said. “Find out where are they buying from? How did the person selling obtain the medications? I’m not a law enforcement officer. I do have US federal law enforcement officers based here in my Embassy who I pleaded with government authorities, please take advantage of them to help you design such an effort to respond.”
Ambassador Gonzales said as soon as the US discovered the countrywide theft in late 2021, they immediately informed the Zambian government of their findings, and initiated across-the-country and on-the-ground assessment of private pharmacies to understand the extent of the issue. He said he was disappointed to share publicly that since 2021 they uncovered systematic theft of life-saving medicines and other products that were intended for free to the Zambian public, including ARVs, anti-tuberculosis and antimalarial treatments.
“It is with a heavy heart that I must announce that the US is cutting US $50 million. That’s K1.4 billion in annual aid to Zambia provided for medications and medical supplies,” he said.
Gonzales said from 2021 through late 2023, more than 2,000 pharmacies were visited in every province and district of this country that sold the same types of products that the United States provided for free to Zambia’s healthcare system. Ambassador Gonzales said shockingly, across those visits, 95 present of the pharmacies that were selling the kinds of products that the United States provided were also selling stolen goods.
“Of those pharmacies selling stolen goods, 45 percent were selling stolen products that the United States had provided to Zambia for free for Zambians in need. Let me repeat that in all 10 provinces, nearly half of the pharmacies that were selling the types of products that the US provides for free for the Zambian people were selling stolen medications and medical supplies donated by the United States government,” he said.
“Now, the rest of the pharmacies that were selling stolen products were selling stolen medicines and supplies from stocks that were purchased by the Zambian government, by the Global Fund, by other donor partners.”
Gonzales said on April 3 l, 2024, he brought this alarming information to the attention of senior Zambian government leaders from multiple ministries and law enforcement agencies.
He said over the next 13 months, through more than 33 senior meetings with government officials by U.S. Embassy staff, senior officials from Washington, and himself, they reiterated their requests to the Zambian government for action to stop the further theft and to bring the culprits to justice. He said the Embassy even offered U.S. government experts in supply chain management and in law enforcement to partner with Zambian counterparts to support the requested efforts.
“I regret that to date, the government’s actions have fallen drastically short of demonstrating a commitment to safeguarding U.S. assistance and the lives that we aim to save with it. Instead of investigating supply sources or pursuing the masterminds behind the theft of medicines, law enforcement operations have focused more often than not on low-level actors and have led to the arrest of only a few mid-level officials,” he said.
Gonzales said more than six months into a forensic audit of the mismanagement of the Zambian Medicines and Medical Supplies Agency (ZAMMSA) there was still no public report, nor had the US received a private report. He said since October, he had alerted senior government officials of his obligation to safeguard American taxpayers’ resources in the face of the gross theft and mismanagement.
“I have stressed repeatedly that the accountable safeguarding of American taxpayer funds will require the US to significantly reduce our contribution of medicines and medical supplies if meaningful action is not taken to hold high-level culprits responsible and to stop that theft and to stop that theft,” he said.
Gonzales said after more than one year of little tangible action by Zambian authorities to address the systematic theft of U.S. provided health support, the US could no longer justify to the American taxpayer continuing to provide massive levels of assistance when the Zambian government did not take the necessary measures to protect this American investment.
“And as a result, and truly with a very heavy heart, the United States government has made this very difficult decision to cut $50 million of our annual support for critically needed medications and medical supplies in Zambia. Again, that’s 1.4 billion Kwacha of assistance that is being lost. The exact parameters of the reduction are not yet finalized, and my embassy team and I remain available to engage with the government to discuss how we do this. This is not a decision that we have taken lightly,” he said.
Gonzales said he had recommended to Washington that to continue to procure and deliver these life-saving medicines and medical supplies to Zambia through the end of this year to provide time to the government to develop a transition plan, to budget and to place procurements to avoid stock outs of these medications.
“After that point, we will offer our technical logistics assistance to support humanitarian activities to prevent drug resistance and disease transmission. But we will cut $50 million a year of our annual contributions to providing malaria, HIV, and tuberculosis medicines,” he said.
“Now, as many of you may know, the Trump administration is in the process of finalizing a broader review of our foreign assistance funding around the world, including here in Zambia. That review is still underway. But I want to stress that this $50 million reduction in our medicines and medical supply budget in Zambia is wholly separate from that. This reduction is exclusively because of the lack of action by the Zambian government to respond to the countrywide systematic theft of American-donated medications and medical supplies, despite more than a year of intense requests and offers of support to realize those objectives.”
Gonzales said the US remained interested in contributing to that future, but were no longer willing to underwrite the personal enrichment of fraudsters or the corrupt when patients went without or had to buy lifesaving medications that were provided for them for free.
Asked if the US would reconsider this decision assuming the government began to take action, Gonzales said after three years of raising the issue, and one year of intensive engagement and requests, the US had made this decision.
“I cannot commit to what may happen in the future. I sincerely hope, however, that the Zambian authorities do take meaningful action, both on accountability as well as on mitigation, because the Zambian people need it. More importantly, the Zambian people deserve it,” he said.
Gonzales said these were resources provided for Zambians and it was not just resources from the United States but government resources and other donor resources.
“So I sincerely hope the government does take action and how the United States may respond to that remains to be seen,” he said.
Asked if he felt that the Zambian government had the ability or potential to take accountable action on such issues, Gonzales said he believed they did.
“I haven’t said that no action has taken place. I think much, much more can be done. That will require resources and prioritisation of funding to do that. There has been months and months and months of engagement and conversation and discussion about how to reform the supply chain process, reforms to ZAMMSA. It’s time to move those discussions to tangible action,” he said. “Again, that will take both resources, as well as the political will and prioritisation, to make those reforms happen and to happen in a sustainable way. So I have no doubt that the Zambian government has the skills and the abilities. And I would reiterate that the United States has until now and will continue to offer technical expert advice to support Zambian authorities, in order to address the things that we are talking about.”
Gonzales said the theft had been going on for multiple years in every province and every district around the country.
“In terms of the depth, I would prefer to wait for the government to release the forensic audit, or at least broad parameters found from the forensic audit. I recognise that the public release of something like that is probably unlikely in the near term, because ideally, the content found from that forensic audit will be used to lead credible investigations,” he said.
“But the dynamics that we’re seeing in terms of the scope, the frequency, the patterns of the theft, leave me with zero doubt that this is an organised criminal endeavor that includes fairly senior people. I’m not saying senior government people but senior people who have the wherewithal and the means to pull off a multi-year, full-of-country, organized criminal endeavor.”
Asked what government’s immediate response was after he engaged them, Gonzales said government promised to take action.
“We heard all the right things. We heard shock, disappointment, commitment. We heard a directive to law enforcement to take immediate action. I used that meeting to stress, not taking immediate overnight action, because it was clear that this was a bigger, more organised endeavor that would require a bigger organised response, an investigation,” he said.
” So around April 5th or so of last year, we saw a great headline. Zambia police go in and they’ve arrested, I think it was 16 people, for selling stolen medicines. I saw a great headline that suggested action was being taken. Over the next month and a half or so, there were two more similar headlines, I think one up in Copperbelt and one in Southern, with the same pattern.”
Gonzales said if this was happening in an organised way across the entirety of the country, it should be responded to in an organised way across the entirety of the country, not by picking up “small fish.”
” The 15-year-old kids behind the counter who were arrested, easy, small fish were picked up. And I have not seen evidence of organised law enforcement response to the organised criminal endeavor since late June of last year. Until January of this year when we did see, DEC did make a couple of arrests. Very eager to see what comes of that,” he said.
Asked why he thought there was resistance to address the issue despite his frantic effort to engage government, and if he thought government officials were benefiting indirectly, Gonzales said he had no indication or reason to believe that senior government officials were or were not involved in this.
“Hopefully, the forensic audit would reveal that, or at least indications of that.That’s really a question for the Zambian government,” said Gonzales.
