By 
Socialist Party (SP) leader, Fred M’membe, has described Lusaka City Council (LCC)’s “Operation Clear Path,” without providing economic alternative, as a human cost of government’s repeated institutional failure.
Lusaka Mayor elect, Chitambala Mwewa, is currently leading a crackdown on street vending in the city after a seven day ultimatum elapsed.
But M’membe maintains that evicting thousands of citizens into functional non-existence does not solve poverty but merely forces it out of sight.
“The local authority must stop hiding behind administrative figures. It is an indictment of the council’s planning that after multiple previous interventions, they still rely on heavy-handed mandates rather than systemic engagement,” he said in a Facebook post on October 3.
He said if LCC was genuinely committed to a long-term transition, it must first prove that its designated markets possess proper sanitation, reliable water, active foot traffic, and above all, transparent, corruption-free allocation processes.
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Until the council demonstrates that, M’membe insists, it should treat informal workers as legitimate economic stakeholders rather than an inconvenience to be managed by police force, adding that the crackdowns would continue to fail.
He said urban order could be built on the hunger of Lusaka’s families.
“As I have repeatedly cautioned in previous statements, driving vendors out without first guaranteeing realistic, accessible, and functional economic alternatives is an act of governance that prioritizes aesthetics over human survival.”
Mr M’membe said the council’s repetitive playbook was as predictable as it was unsustainable.
“Every few years, an eviction campaign is launched, livelihoods are abruptly broken overnight, and the local authority points to supposedly vacant market spaces as a universal cure. But if these official markets were truly viable, safe, and located where the public actually shops, the streets would not be teeming with traders,” he argued.
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