Airline implosion marks end of my trip

Yesterday, after nearly four weeks on the road in four different African countries, I arrived home. Lusaka, Zambia. A city that meant very little to me as recently as six months ago now evokes wonderful feelings of friendship and familiarity. Returning here felt something like returning home, even though I'll be leaving for good in a few weeks with no concrete plans to return.

I spent the last few days of my trip with two Canadian friends in Johannesburg. Meg, Kate and I caught up over delicious and affordable cappuccinos and thin-crust pizzas in Melville, one of Joburg's trendy and relatively mixed-race post-apartheid neighbourhoods. It's a far cry from the crime and violence that's reputed to plague Joburg, and a nice place to reacquaint with old friends.

On Sunday morning, with a few hours until my planned flight back to Lusaka, I woke up intending to visit Soweto – once notorious for apartheid abuses and consequent struggles, now increasingly known for its fast-growing middle classes – until I checked my email and plans changed. Zambian Airways had "suspended operations until further notice" the day before, with all signs pointing toward bankruptcy.

The company, Zambia's largest airline, cited "high fuel costs over the last year-and-a-half and the need to restructure its operations"; its debt is said to surpass $25 million. All airplanes were grounded in Lusaka. My housemate Aaron, stuck in the same situation, overheard a Zambian Airways staff telling his spouse over the phone to prepare to move within the month because he'd lost his job. Another seemingly informed staff member claimed that Air Zambezi, a much smaller carrier than Zambian Airways, had purchased newer and larger jets as if anticipating the events now taking place.

I lost a one hundred dollar plane ticket and scrambled to find another way home. Thankfully, I found an affordable South African Airways ticket for the same day – although the flight was overbooked and I was put up in a hotel for the night. In any case, I resigned myself to the situation, accepting that there's nothing I could ever have done to anticipate it, and I should just move on.

That is, until I learned more about the reason for the airline's collapse. It so happens that Fred Mmembe, infamous as the editor of The Post newspaper, which lambasted President Rupiah Banda daily throughout election campaigns and remains the president's nemesis, is a board member of Zambian Airways. Apparently, the airline has been feuding with President Banda and his MMD party for some time now, and the MMD coldly refused to respond to a desperate plea for help in late 2008.

If Zambian Airways collapsed because of troublesome economic times, the decline in copper prices and the related struggles of the Zambian Kwacha, so be it. If, on the other hand, the airline's demise is the result of high-level, back-door political quarreling, I want my money back!


View Larger Map
This map roughly documents my route from Lusaka to Johannesburg, totalling approximately 3,000 km traversed in over 20 separate public and private buses, minibuses, shared taxis, pickup trucks and one ferry for good measure. I'll post pictures tomorrow.