The Itezhi Tezhi magistrates court has convicted and fined a 28-year-old man for using a prohibited net to catch fish.
Before magistrate Munalula Mubita was Obed Makina, 28, of Chibolya compound in Itezhi Tezhi district who stood charged with the offence of being in possession of prohibited fishing net namely a mosquito net.
Mr. Makina was arrested during the fish ban period which ended on 28th February 2014.
Facts before the court were that on 5th February 2014 officers from the department of fisheries accompanied by state police were conducting a patrol during the fish ban on Kafue River when they saw Obed Makina with another unknown person in a boat catching fish using a mosquito net.
The court heard that upon seeing the officers Makina and his accomplice paddled to the shore but the officers made a chase with a speed boat and apprehended him while his unknown co-accused ran away.
The confiscated fish was later disposed off by the Itezhi Tezhi magistrate court.
Magistrate Munalula Mubita convicted Makina after he admitted the offence and ordered him to pay a fine of K1,000 or in default serve nine months imprisonment.
ZANIS
Was he fined for using improper tools? i.e mosquito net or because fishing was generally banned during the period the poor man was fishing?
WE have called for USEFUL MPS from UPND who are serving in our Government to RESIGN THEN we grab the SEATS in our party ..such things would not happen
Please leave these poor people alone. They are being creative to put food on the table (if they even have any tables). I am willing to pay this man’s penalty. And those poor women in the picture, I wonder if they know how dangerous it is to stand in water like that. Oh my people in Zambia!!!
wats wrong to use a moquito net to catch fish? ba zawa ba nsomba guide me on this.
some mosquito nets are treated with strong chemicals that would contaminate the catch as well as the water in which the the net is cast. A more convincing reason would be the fact that a mosquito net would indiscriminately catch small and big fishes at the same time there by depleting the fish population hence the ban in the first place.
How about people who use the moskito nests as a net for soccer?