We were delighted to be able to broadcast the latest edition of the Chanters Lodge Experience with the Milli Jam Ingredient featuring George Kaufela last Sunday as usual. Why? Well, Zambia was in national mourning for late Hon. Kennedy Sakeni, chief government spokesman, and in the past we wouldn’t have been able to broadcast a music show, but the rules changed and national mourning applied only between 06.00 and 18.00 hrs daily, so that was alright then. On the show we offered condolences to the late’s family and friends. Why a sports report experience? Because our Guest on this show was Heinz Nawa Munene (above) intrepid, talkative and knowledgeable sports reporter on Zambezi 107.7 fm. It was Nawa’s second appearance on our show and we were delighted to welcome him back!

Mr Munene reminded listeners that he’d last appeared on our programme in 2009 and informed us that as well as being a sports presenter with three shows per week on Zambezi fm, he’s also a trainee primary school teacher undergoing a course at Mosi-o-Tunya College in Livingstone – he hopes to finish his teacher training later this year and to start teaching full time in the new year. We expressed the wish that in that case he would continue to present on 107.7 fm and he confirmed that he would. Milli Jam raised the question of the future of Herve Renard the Zambian national football coach following the national team’s recent elimination from the 2014 World Cup and Nawa thought it was time for a change. A fairly heated debate followed! He also expressed the wish to see many more talented, locally based, players in the national team squad in the future – he named plenty of the ones he had in mind!

The music on the show was great despite one of the presenters having a different, rather than the current, play list in his pocket – causing some initial confusion! We opened with tracks from Jason Aldean and Jessie J’s latest ‘Square One’. George chose Zambian tracks from Espe and Krummy, King Dandy Krazy ft JK. Milli Jam dropped items from Wale and Toni Braxton. Our oldie of the week was Beyonce’s ‘Listen’ surprisingly currently back in the UK charts, and the prize of a dinner for two at the lodge to the first person to text us the name of the artist was quickly snapped up. My pick of the week was Jennifer Hudson’s newie ‘Bleed For Love’.

Nawa told listeners that he was still single after all these years but definitely hoped to be married by 2017. He seemed to have a definite plan in this regard despite being teased by other presenters. He revealed that for a while recently he had also been a TV sports presenter with Muvi TV which he’d enjoyed a lot, allowing him amongst other duties, to meet top sports personalities like Kalusha Bwalya and Renard himself. He also enjoyed commentating on football matches which he did regularly on 107.7 fm for Council Pirates home games in Livingstone. He was scathing about the management of that team and bemoaned the fact that Southern Province was the only province without a team in the Zambia Premier League. He also revealed that he is the administrator for a local amateur team Eastlands FC. Busy chap our Heinz!

Asked where he would like to be and what he would like to be doing ten years’ from now this young, hardworking, driven, young sports enthusiast said he would like to be in South Africa as a full time presenter with DSTV’s Supersport TV channel. We wouldn’t bet against that!

If you missed the show and would like to listen to the Podcast, here’s the link (thanks to George Soulchild!)