Since I have not provided an email address on this column for feedback, I am getting some informal verbal responses from readers.
The unfortunate part is that most of the response is confrontational, sometimes even combative.
One UNZA lecturer recently accosted me in a pub and accused me of being unnecessarily outspoken, blunt and at times annoying.
He said I have been harsh on intellectuals and the state of Africa, a continent he said usually I portray as being desperate with no solution for it’s redemption in sight.
I feel my critics are entitled to their opinion just as I am also  at liberty to express my views on any subject. Isn’t it Voltaire who famously said I do not agree with what you have to say, but I’ll defend to the death your right to say it?
Coming back to my academic colleague who accosted me, I know his bone of contention emanated from an article I wrote some time back where I charged that African Intellectuals are copycats who can’t initiate anything new ending up regurgitating what the white boys have written about.
Instead of debating my observation, the academician went to town propounding mouthing the same lame defence why Africa is such a pathetic place quoting a number of afro centric scholars.
I told him that I have heard his cocktail of argument from other apologists who don’t see anything wrong in this continent.
He is among several other readers who accuse me of being pessimists who only sees squalor in most African countries. I feel the intelligent question should be why I see squalor instead of signs of things improving.
By now people know my views on the state of affairs in Zambia or Africa, literature, Zambian journalism and the opposition.
Since I am highly opinionated, I would continue writing without allowing for feedback. I have done this deliberately to allow my views stand out more prominently than those of my critics whether they agree with me or not.
Others even wonder if I am better place to handle the number of subjects I comment on. To this ilk, I can only say knowledge should never be monopolised by anybody no matter how informed one claims to be.
Knowledge can emanate from anywhere and should never be a preserve of the educated, older generation, urban dwellers since we all live in the same world which we can interpret according to our experiences. I even dismiss the word ‘expert’ with the scorn it deserves.
On my right to comment on anything, I feel I am everything people say I am; critic, columnist, iconoclast or even non conformist.
I am almost obsessed with analyses based on a foundation of sound logic and unassailable facts. Lies are an inappropriate vehicle for making progress.
For this reason I would love my critics to painstakingly do research on what they comment on. I read a lot of poor scholarly work on this country by people who announce themselves as experts, researchers and academicians.
I wouldn’t like such half truths and lies to go unquestioned as if they are being peddled by angels.
If you forced me to talk about myself, I would say I am hereditarily inclined to be inquisitive, always questioning and analysing what other accept as the gospel truth.
I love the occasional controversy though I hate confrontation that is why I want to revisit accepted truths and unmask their short comings.
I have been a journalist since the Kaunda days and thus I can offer my opinion on where our society is headed to politically, socially and even economically.
Others even argue that my pessimism of things is a result of the eight years I was out in England. I left Zambia in 2001 and the country moved on without me, it is just that I still hold on to my mother country like a rejected lover.
Some of my critics even claim that I take a swipe at society just because I have a platform to do so. What these people forget is that journalists even fiction writers no longer enjoy the monopoly on opinion since there is the internet which has given almost everyone a voice.
I am not a perfect person myself but all I would like Zambians to do is to probe a little further for them to differentiate between a mirage and a real tangible object.
My seemingly harsh words are meant to remind us that in many ways we are an integral part of the problem that we say Zambia or Africa has become.
Owning accountability in the work that needs to be done and would be a great contribution to the solution.
The good news is that we are having robust conversations about the issues that keep resurfacing like a cancer. Once people get over their anger at my words and my attitude, they tend to settle down and really think about things and talk about them.
I am a fierce critic of Africa and it’s wretchedness that seems to be part of the continent.
Though I am not saying European countries have no warts, at least we can give them credit for one thing-accountability which is a strange word in most sub-Saharan African countries.
I say this because accountability is the engine and breathe that drives behaviour, that guns morality in most European countries.
For Africa accountability is a non-existent term since no one seems to understand it.
I purposefully set out to confront our traducers and some of my friends in the literary and academic world frontally so that we revisit our interventions that are partially to blame for the Frankenstein society we have created.
It is a crusade that doesn’t call for pulling of punches but calling a spade a spade and not a big spoon.
My blood runs cold when I see Africans celebrating mediocrity proudly cheering rogues and charlatans who are always in abundance in this part of the world.
I ask why we cheer these masqueraders. I frankly do not care what the multitudes of people believe in since I have little respect for the people they worship.
It is sad to note that nothing seems to make a difference in Africa where some rulers, the clergy and academicians have no integrity whatsoever.
Though at one time these were revered men and women who gave direction to their societies, now they are part of the infamous hall or rogues who are delaying the second coming of Jesus Christ.
They now mislead the same people they are supposed to shepherd ignoring their cries which reach out to heaven for an explanation.
It is such a desperate situation that calls for a few Jeremiahs who can expose these broods of vipers, with a view of improving things.