Clement Chipokolo from Zambia takes issue with Alex Avery of the Hudson Institute, USA, who has talked about the "blood of the starvation victims" in Zambia being on the hands of those with concerns about GMOs.

Clement writes:

...you mentioned that there were several deaths that resulted from the decision that the government took. May I put it to you that the only recorded deaths that we know of were before the GM saga came to the fore.

...your statements are typical of a well funded lobbyist who would do what ever it takes to achieve his mission, in this case promotion of GMOs.

...just on Tuesday our government announced that the country faces a maize deficit of 300,000 metric tonnes and has appealed for help. I was wondering what kind of help would come from your end. Please make sure it is not GM because it might just go back. 'Know today what you are going to eat, as for me and my country we shall eat no GMOs' (Adapted from the Book of Joshua)

Below is Clement's full response to Alex Avery. For Avery's claims see:
Avery challenged over "blood of starvation victims" smear
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=5030
'Avery says Benbrook has blood on his hand'
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4993
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On 24/3/05 10:51 am, "clement chipokolo" <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.> wrote:

Dear Alex,

I refer to your article entitled 'More to Blame Zambian Decision to Reject U.S. Food Aid' and your subsequent e-mail conversation with Robert Vint of Genetic Food Alert in the U.K. If you were really concerned about the deaths caused by the decision taken by my government decision to reject the GMO food that was to be pushed down our throats by donors in 2002, you wrongly titled your article.

Your article was supposed to be titled 'More to Blame for the Zambian Deaths due to Hunger'. From the initial title it is clear that you have an agenda, that's to promote GMOs. The tone of both your article and e-mails portrays a bitter man still angry with a decision that made you suffer a loss. I am both a trained agriculturalist and psychologist, I should know that. I will now answer you as a Zambian, born, bred, educated and working in Zambia, 24 years ago.

In your conversation with Bob, you mentioned that there were several deaths that resulted from the decision that the government took. May I put it to you that the only recorded deaths that we know of were before the GM saga came to the fore. The deaths were reported to parliament by Hon. Vitalis Mooya, Member of Parliament for Moomba Constituency in the Southern Province of Zambia which was greatly affected by the drought. You may wish to know that government had vehemently denied that allegation by Mr. Mooya but when civil society confronted them with proof, they kept quiet. If you were in Zambia today, I would have instituted legal proceedings against you for actions and statements bent on causing public alarm. If you have proof about the deaths, I will gladly accept and retract my statement.

You claim that you are not a lobbyist but a policy analyst but your statements are typical of a well funded lobbyist who would do what ever it takes to achieve his mission, in this case promotion of GMOs.

As Bob says, other than you talking about Zambia accepting GMOs or not, it would make more economic and humanitarian sense to help our farmers if you channel your money towards programmes aimed at helping them develop more sustainable and viable methods of farming, something they have done time immemorial. You say your stepmother lived in Zambia for many years, my own mother is Zambian and she is a small scale farmer who has been farming sustainably for a long time on her small piece of land in addition to her job as a civil servant. You may want to know that money realized from the sale of the harvested crop, helped pay for my University education which is no cheap thing in this country.

Talking about, tribal politics, what is the relationship between that and the decision taken by the government? That statement shows that you are ignorant about how Zambians live. Zambia has 73 tribes which have co-existed peacefully for the last 41 years of independence without any conflict resulting from a state decision as this one referred to here.

Talking of Golden Rice, I will want to tell you that rice is no where in our vocabulary as a food. My typical meal is maize meal cooked in to a hard porridge called nshima which we enjoy with vegetables or meat (both of which are not GM of course). Sorry, I don't think that it would be a workable idea to stuff GM rice down our throats at the pretext of curing our Vitamin A deficiencies. In fact, I think we sensed that you might just want to that and that’s why we actually fortified our sugar with Vitamin A. So, I don't think we need the rice, feed it to the birds.

Tell you something, just on Tuesday our government announced that the country faces a maize deficit of 300,000 metric tonnes and has appealed for help. I was wondering what kind of help would come from your end. Please make sure it is not GM because it might just go back. 'Know today what you are going to eat, as for me and my country we shall eat no GMOs' (Adapted from the Book of Joshua.)

Yours Faithfully,
Clement Chipokolo