By KASONDE KASONDE

THE Zambia Consumer Association (ZACA) has said stimulating investment and economic growth is key for developing countries to recover from the effects of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

ZACA executive secretary Juba Sakala said African countries, in particular, require support for them to recover from the negative effects of the pandemic. Mr Sakala said in an interview that there were more challenges that Africa faced because of its beliefs in democracy theories as countries spent more time debating at the expense of delivering tangible development.

“Africa swallowed democracy faster, before chewing it and is faced with problems,” he said.

Mr Sakala said most Eastern bloc countries did not promote democracy summits at the expense of development but focused more on development. He said because of that, most Asian countries were fast developing and were overcoming poverty.

“In the recent past, most African countries have realised that the issue of democracy has left us poorer than before and it is more rhetoric, as a result, most of them have diverted attention to Eastern countries that are focused on survival and development issues,” Mr Sakala said.

He said countries were spending more time attending summits and theories instead of delivering tangible development to the people. Mr Sakala said survival was a priority for African countries, especially that people were faced with problems citing food scarcity and drug shortages.