A NIGHTMARE AVERTED

Dear Editor,
ON Wednesday, December 2, 2020, I received an anxious call from one of the Zambian expatriate teachers based in Seychelles.
Mr. Gift Jere’s wife, Gift Chirwa had missed a scheduled flight from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia to Victoria, Seychelles.
She was a transiting traveller and had spent a night in Addis Ababa.
The hotel shuttle bus took her late to the airport and she missed the early morning flight to Seychelles.
Airline officials told her that the next flight was only due on Friday.
Since her Covid-19 test was done in Lusaka, a few days before her travel, it will expire by the time she flies on Friday making her ineligible to fly.
She needed to take a fresh Covid-19 test and arrange accommodation for the two nights she would spend in Addis Ababa.
On Wednesday evening hotel authorities took her to a Covid-19 test centre and it cost her $138 to do a fresh test. When we picked up the story on Thursday, she informed us that sadly, the test results were out and she had tested positive to the corona virus!
This meant that she had to stay in quarantine or possible treatment in Addis Ababa for another seven to 14 days, and at her own cost!
The story did not make sense!
Gift missed her flight at the fault of the hotel and her test results was positive from a centre she was taken to by hotel personnel.
I have a lot of faith in institutions but I am also aware that these systems are prone to abuse by syndicates and unscrupulous persons.
As a team we went to work.
We demanded a fresh independent Covid-19 test to act as a second opinion.
You can imagine my official taking Gift, who had been declared positive, to search for other Covid-19 test sites.
This created anxieties for both Gift and my official.
Well, we have great news.
The new test results for Gift are out and were negative and she is on her way to Victoria, Seychelles to join her husband.

EMMANUEL MWAMBA,
Ambassador,

Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.