Professor Oliver Saasa is the Chancellor of Mulungushi University. He is Professor of International Economic Relations and Managing Consultant/CEO of Premier Consult Limited, a social, business and economic consulting Firm based in Lusaka. Before he joined the Consulting World in 2000 by setting up his own firm, Prof. Saasa served for 12 years as the Director of the Institute of Economic and Social Research at the University of Zambia. Before that, he was Head of the Department of Development Studies at the same University. During his 21-year academic career with the University of Zambia, he served for the most part in the University Senate and as member of some of the University Council committees. He was promoted to the rank of Professor in 1994.

A Rhodes Scholar, Prof. Saasa obtained his doctorate in 1983 from Southampton University in the UK. His doctoral thesis is on the regulation of transnational corporation in developing countries: A Comparative Analysis of national policy-making towards international investment in Zambia and Tanzania.

Prof. Saasa has published widely in the field of trade, international economic relations and economic development, concentrating in earlier years on regional integration and trade promotion in Southern Africa. In the past 15 years, he has released several publications on the relations between developed and developing countries, focusing primarily on aid flows and donor-recipient structures for aid management. His most recent publications include the book published in Sweden, Aid and Poverty Reduction in Zambia: Mission Unaccomplished, a highly acclaimed publication in the field of aid relationships and effectiveness.

Prof. Saasa has served as a consultant for many regional and international organisations that include the World Bank, OECD, UNDP, UNICEF, USAID, EU, UNCTAD, Sida, IFAD, NORAD, GIZ, JICA, DfID, Danida, COMESA, and SADC, mainly evaluating their programme and project support to Southern Africa and Zambia. Prof. Saasa serves on many boards at both national and international levels. These include the National Governing Council of the APRM (Zambia); Zambia Railways Limited Board of Director where he is Vice-Chair; Public Service Pensions Fund (Zambia); Stanbic Bank; and Governing Council of the International Africa Institute (UK), and African Technology Policy Studies Network (ATPS). Lastly, Prof. Saasa was hired by the Zambian Government to prepare Zambia’s Aid Policy and Strategy and did put together on behalf of the Ministry of Finance the country’s Fifth National Development Plan (FNDP).