New Zambian President Promises Bold Agenda
Voice of America
LUSAKA - New Zambian President Hakainde Hichilema took office on Tuesday, 12 days after defeating incumbent Edgar Lungu in a general election.
VOA's Peter Clottey sat down with Hichilema before Tuesday's inauguration to discuss goals for his five-year term. Hichilema covered a wide range of topics and promised to improve a poor economy, defend human rights, and have better relations regionally and with Washington. Excerpts from the 55-minute interview: VOA: What would you want to have achieved within the first 100 days? Hichilema: One, we want to reunite this country. This country has been divided for so many years and the divisions are visible. You just have to look anywhere, you see them in the workplaces, in the market areas, divisions all over.Palestinians gather at the site of an Israeli strike on a camp for internally displaced people in Rafah on May 27, 2024. Fire rages following an Israeli strike on an area designated for displaced Palestinians, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, in this still picture taken from a video, May 26, 2024. Palestinians gather at the site of an Israeli strike on a camp for internally displaced people in Rafah on May 27, 2024. A member of the bomb squad of the Israeli police collects debris after a rocket fired by Palestinian militants struck in the Israeli city of Herzliya on May 26, 2024.
Georgian President Salome Zourabichvili, right, and Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze, left, leave a podium after marking Independence Day in Tbilisi, Georgia, May 26, 2024. Demonstrators with Georgian national and EU flags rally during an opposition protest against a foreign influence bill as they mark their country's Independence Day, in the center of in Tbilisi, Georgia, May 26, 2024.