In a small workshop in Zambia’s capital Lusaka, abandoned pieces of metal and copper have become the main source of motivation behind the creativity of a group of women, who have been converting the scrap to jewelry and raking in profits.
T-Bwoy releases “Loving you” Video
Brand New video “Loving You ” by T Bwoy. Directed by Qbick and Lawdak for Nxt Solutionz
BY KAPA187
Nevers Mumba welcomes the adoption of 50% plus 1 clause
The opposition Movement for Multiparty Democracy (MMD) has predicted a re-run in the 2016 presidential election following the passing of the 50 percent plus one vote clause by parliament.
Addressing a media briefing in Lusaka this morning, MMD President Dr. Nevers Mumba notes that the outcome in Parliament this morning is due to sustained pressure on the PF to at least give the Zambian people clauses which would assist in ensuring that the next election is conducted in an atmosphere of expanded liberties.
Dr. Mumba says his party supported the parliamentary route using common sense, stating that the nation would not have attained the victory of the 50 percent plus one vote clause and presidential running mate clause had his party not supported the process.
Dr. Mumba says he is delighted that as a party they remained focused and consistent and provided direction and sense of clear purpose in making history to enact clauses that Zambians have looked forward to over a very long period of time.
He cited some of the clauses he says were close to the hearts of the MMD as 50 % plus one, presidential running mate, dual citizenship, strengthening of the Auditor General’s office to effect prosecutions of erring civil servants, mandatory national debt contraction through parliament and the prevention of parliamentary defections and crossing the floor in an effort to bring order to the house.
The Members of Parliament had to debate the constitution bill the whole night into today following a motion moved by Vice President for the house to adjourn sine die upon completion of all business on the order paper.
Members of Parliament voted 111 to 37 for the constitution amendment bill to be read the third time around 08:15 hours this morning.
They also voted in favour of having the Constitution of Zambia Bill read for a third time.
The house had earlier voted to remove the article on provincial assemblies, marinating clauses such as the 50% plus one vote threshold for a winning presidential candidate, the running mate and dual citizenship among others.
And Parliament has passed the K53.14 billion 2016 national budget.
The house has since adjourned sine die after marathon proceedings which started yesterday at 14:30 hours until this morning at about 09:43 hours.
ZESCO restores power following blackout
firm’s pavilion yesterday during the ongoing eighth Southern Tourism,
Agricultural and Commercial Show Society (STACSS) in Livingstone
Eight out of ten of the country’s provinces were last night plunged into total darkness following a system disturbance at Kariba North Bank power station.Kapata
Only Southern and Western provinces remained with electricity as they are supplied by Victoria Fall power station.
ZESCO Spokesperson Henry Kapata says electricity supply has been restored to Copperbelt, north western and central provinces.
Mr. Kapata adds that investigations are continuing to ascertain what caused the system disturbance.
Almost the entire Zambia was in darkness after a fault at Kariba dam caused the tripping of Kariba South-Kariba North tie line.
Energy Minister Dora Siliya confirmed that the outage which started around 23 Hours on Thursday has affected all provinces except for western and southern provinces which are supplied through the Victoria Falls power station.
‘We lost power supply to entire country except for Western and Southern provinces after the tripping of Kariba South-Kariba North tie line which was carrying our imports of about 560 MW. This triggered the trippings of generators at kariba north and later Kafue gorge on overload. Restoration is in progress and Lusaka should be back on supply in next 30 minutes,’ Ms Siliya said.
Two veteran Zambians journalists elected to UNESCO communication and information sector
Two veteran Zambian journalists, Mrs Juliana Mwila and Mr Gilbert Maimbo, have been elected members of UNESCO’s communication and information sector for the years 2015 and 2016.
This follows the duo’s successful candidature floated by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting Services during the recent UNESCO General conference in Paris, France.
Mrs Mwila who once served as Director General at the Zambia National Broadcasting Corporation, ZNBC, before her retirement later as Director for Press and Planning in the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting Services, will sit on UNESCO’s Information For All Programme, IFAP, while Mr Maimbo, a former Director of Zambia News and Information Service, ZANIS, will represent the country on UNESCO’s International Programme for the Development of Communication, IPDC.
“The election of the duo to sit on these important UNESCO organs, is a source of immense pride and honour to the Zambian media fraternity and the country at large. It is also a sign of the confidence the international community has in Zambia’s media and governance system,” says Information and Broadcasting Services Permanent Secretary Mr Godfrey Malama, who attended the UNESCO General conference in Paris.
Mr Malama added that Government was confident that Mrs Mwila and Mr Maimbo will effectively represent the country on this high profile assignment given their longstanding experience and expertise in the communication and information sector.
The last decade has witnessed technological developments at a scale and speed unprecedented in the history of humankind.
IFAP, an inter-governmental programme created in 2000, is UNESCO’s response to the challenges and opportunities of the information society while the IPDC, on the other hand, not only provides support for media projects, but also seeks to secure a healthy environment for the growth of free and pluralistic media in developing countries.
HH responds to PF’s take on his Solutions for Job Losses in the Mines
United Party for National Development(UPND) President Hakainde Hichilema has issued a statement in response to Patriotic Front (PF) take on his solutions to deal with job losses due to mines scaling back.
Wednesday, PF said that the announcement by Anglo America to lay off 85 000 workers had exposed UPND leader, Hakainde Hichilema’s lies and deceit about his plans for the mining sector.
PF Information and Publicity chairperson, Frank Bwalya said that Zambians now know that Mr. Hichilema lied when he promised miners on the Copperbelt that Anglo America will save their jobs once he is voted into power.
Father Bwalya said it was sad that Mr. Hichilema’s continued attribution of the loss of jobs on the mines to President Edgar Lungu’s leadership.
He challenged Mr. Hichilema and the Post Newspaper to tell Zambians if Mr. Lungu is also the President for countries where Anglo America will lay off workers.
Father Bwalya advised the opposition leaders to stop misleading Zambians because no amount of deceit will hoodwink citizens to vote for them.
Anglo America had announced that it will downsize its workforce from 135 000 to 50 000 due to drop in commodity prices.
Below is Mr Hichilema’s response to Father Bwalya’s statement
OFFICIAL STATEMENT
UPND restates strong commitment to mine workers and suppliers
It has been drawn to our attention that certain individuals are spreading malicious rumours regarding our reaction to recent layoffs in the mining sector and our proposed intervention after the people of Zambia elect us into office in 2016.
Rather than waste further time bemoaning the vicious insults from Government and the PF cadres we want to take this opportunity to restate our position and our strong commitment to the affected workers, contractors and suppliers.
Simply put the recent layoffs are a tragedy. There is no cause for celebration by anyone. Each and every worker that has lost their job has numerous dependents, and coming at a time when the price of bread has doubled in just a few short months it is clear that many families are now facing extreme hardship. Let us draw a parallel, whereas the US just created not less than 200,000 jobs as more than 10,000 of our miners were losing jobs. We will try to put this into perspective, a miner supports 5 other people in their house hold, a job loss for a miner immediately consigns 5 people to poverty, essentially 50,000 plus people on the Copperbelt have lost a source of livelihood.
While it is clear that lower copper prices have presented a challenge to copper mines in recent months, we have to ask ourselves why it is that companies are choosing to cut back or close their Zambian operations specifically. There are two key factors in this equation: firstly, the electricity crisis, and secondly, government interference. And this is a fact, Chile whose economy could be said to also be copper dependent has not had a single mine close operations. They have not cut down half the production like what has happened in Zambia. Chile projects 6 million metric tons in 2015, they have cut back that production to 5.94 million, where as Zambia projected 900,000 but have cut back to 441,000 due to cost of doing business driven by bad and inconsistent fiscal policies.
The PF has been in government for four years and in that time we have seen four different mining tax regimes. You do not have to be an economist to see that changing the tax regime willy nilly is bad for business. It is also symptomatic of a broader lack of direction and haphazard approach, which isn’t good enough and arguably is an insult to those employed in the sector. What is even worse is threatening private capital every time they make a business decision. Imagine you are selling fritters by the roadside, and every time you increase prices, the Government threatens you, would you be safe and confident of such a Government?
The failure of the PF to identify the looming electricity shortfall before its onset, acknowledge the causes of the crisis, or manage and communicate a sensible load shedding schedule have increased costs for the mines. This is an obvious problem at a time of low prices. Business goes through cycles but we should understand that it’s incumbent upon Governments to ameliorate tough times when business hits turbulence and not kick them further down by holding back their VAT refunds, money they would have used to maintain the fired miners.
After four years of PF government it is the above is the situation we find ourselves in; so the question becomes what would we do differently? Here is a breakdown of how the UPND would seek to protect our workers and businesses that operate in the sector:
Repair relationships – The only way to deliver sustainable growth of the sector, and thereby protect jobs, is through constructive engagement with mining companies, unions and contractors. That means listening with an open mind, consulting extensively before changing the rules and regulations, regular communication with the various parties and not responding with empty angry threats at the first sign of trouble. This is what we are doing in February 2016 during the Mining Indaba in Cape Town.
Create a competitive environment – We can protect our own mines by ensuring they are more competitive. This means addressing the current electricity crisis and learning from what other countries are doing to attract investment even at times of low prices. It also means regulatory stability, as even before the recent fall in prices we have seen investment decisions postponed that could have created more jobs due to the uncertainty. As PF is issuing threats they have no time to listen to the mining houses on the cost structure which has led to job losses.
Protect our workers – Thousands of Zambians work in the mining sector, and thousands more depend on the income of a relative who works in the sector including children and vulnerable people as we have stated above. These people need a Government that prioritises their jobs, ensures adequate support systems are in place and that has contingency plans for various price scenarios.
Build up reserves – The PF has failed to use the time of high prices to build up reserves to be used at times of low prices. It is well known that commodity prices are cyclical and that there will therefore be times of high prices and times of low. To not plan for this is extremely short sighted.
Diversification – By diversifying our economy we can reduce our reliance on mining, meaning that if the industry contracts Zambian workers and businesses have other opportunities open to them. In the current situation we already have high levels of unemployment but if we can stimulate growth and investment in areas such as tourism, agribusiness and retail then opportunities for workers to re-train or suppliers to themselves diversify will increase.
A final few words of advice to our colleagues in the PF: how many more times do we have to say it? If you focus as much time and energy serving the people of Zambia as you do slandering your political opponents then, with a bit of direction, progress can be made. But ultimately the perfect description of the PF approach is this “If the only tool you have is a hammer, all problems will look like nails!” So it is with the PF that all they have to offer as solution to our challenges are political manoeuvres, such as preventing freedom of movement and slandering political opponents, when in fact what Zambia needs now is good economic management.
Hakainde Hichilema
UPND President
“Together We Can”
Parliament in overnight constitutional amendments
Members of Parliament have spent the entire Thursday night and into the early hours of Friday morning debating amendments to the draft constitution.
By 07 Hours, MPs were still debating the Constitutional Bill of the National Assembly of Zambia No. 17 of 2015 as the House is likely to adjourn sine die on Friday.
MPs from the ruling PF and the MPs formed alliances and passed several amendments to the Bill.
Articles such as the establishment of Provincial Assemblies and increasing Parliament by 94 nominated MPs have been rejected.
The 50+1 and the presidential running mate clauses passed while the proposal to have Cabinet appointed from outside Parliament was rejected.
The article on dual citizenship was also passed.
Most of the PF MPs who debated said the amendments were necessarily as they are meant to save costs.
Roan MP Chishimba Kambwili said establishing provincial assemblies and increasing the number of seats in Parliament would have added 538 more people on Government payroll.
Kabwata MP Given Lubinda said the ruling party had to take the lead in making amendments as it was representing the will of the people.
Meanwhile, the Law Association of Zambia (LAZ) has charged that stakeholders who were against the parliamentary route to adopt the constitution will be vindicated soon.
LAZ President George Chisanga has told QFM News in interview that the issues that were raised by stakeholders such as the Grand Coalition, Oasis Forum and others will soon come to the fore during the ongoing constitution reform process.
Mr. Chisanga has explained that as things stand, Members of Parliament have the powers to include anything that they want in the constitution as well as remove certain clauses.
He says this makes it difficult to keep what the people had submitted through various constitution forums.
Mr. Chisanga states that the new constitution of Zambia will not be enacted in the manner the PF promised the people.
And Young African Leaders Initiative (YALI) President Andrew Nthewewe says it is too early to state whether the parliamentary route will not produce positive results.
Mr. Nthewewe says his organization has been assured that concerns raised of manipulating the content should be ignored.
ZRA raids Post Newspaper for another Tax investigation
The Zambia Revenue Authority (ZRA), Investigations Department, yesterday raided and conducted a search at The Post Newspapers after receiving information alleging tax malpractice by the Newspaper.
This was after the information received was evaluated and a decision was made to undertake full scale tax investigations so as to prove or disprove the allegations leveled against the Post Newspaper.
According to a statement made available to QFM News last evening, as per procedure a search warrant was obtained by ZRA to search and collect relevant business records for subsequent examinations by the investigators.
The statement says however, the Post Newspapers obtained a stay of execution against the action of ZRA in a related matter in which the Authority issued a warrant of distress on the Newspaper in November, 2015 seeking the payment of about 9 million kwacha outstanding tax payment, the action which prompted ZRA to seek clarification on extent of the stay.
It says the court clarified that the stay did not cover the matters that were not before the court; therefore, ZRA has thus proceeded with its planned normal Investigations process whose findings will be discussed with the taxpayer.
The statement clarifies that the current Investigation of the Post Newspaper is a normal process that ZRA undertakes on all taxpayers that are alleged to be involved in tax malpractices.
It furthermore states that these investigations are conducted in accordance with ZRA core values which include Professionalism, Integrity, Fairness and Equity among others.
In The Kitchen With Kanta : Chocolate cake
It’s Friday and that means its cheat day; and what better way to cheat than with a decadent and utterly scrumptious Chocolate cake. This cake doesn’t need much of an introduction – chocolate cake, is chocolate cake. It’s rich, flavoursome, sweet, and literally melts in your mouth, but don’t take my word for it; try it yourself.
Preparation: 30min| Baking: 20min| Ready in: 50min
Serves: 10
Ingredients
For the chocolate cake
- 3 large eggs
- 175g self raising flour
- 175g caster sugar
- 175g softened butter
- 1½ level tsp baking powder
- 40g cocoa powder
For the buttercream icing
- 85g butter
- 175g icing sugar
- 2 tablespoons cocoa powder
- 1 tablespoon milk
Method
Combine the flour and cocoa powder.
Preheat the oven to 170 ?C / Gas 3. Grease and flour two 8 inch round cake tins, or one 3 inch deep, 8 inch round cake tin.
Put all of the margarine and sugar into a large mixing bowl and cream them together with an electric mixer until the mixture is pale, creamy and fluffy.
Crack one egg into the margarine/sugar mixture. It is important that you do not over whisk at this point; use the mixer on its lowest setting until the egg is just mixed in. Repeat this process with the second egg and then the third egg.
Sieve the flour-cocoa mixture into the mixing bowl, gradually. Give the mixture a quick stir with a wooden spoon; then turn the mixer on and mix everything together very well.
Divide the mixture evenly between the two tins. Bake in the preheated oven for about 20 minutes. To make sure the cake is cooked completely, insert a knife or tooth pick through the centre of the cake, if they come back clean then the cake is done. Remove the cake from the oven and let it cool on a cooling rack.
Whilst the cake cools, make your buttercream icing; mix the butter and icing sugar well until smooth. Add in cocoa powder and milk and mix again until smooth; once the cake is cool, spread over your light and sweet buttercream icing; and decorate with chocolate sprinkles if you’d like.
Serving
Chocolate cake always goes down well with a hot brew, but if you want something other than tea and are feeling extra adventurous, then enjoy it with a hot mug of cocoa – every chocoholics dream.
Kanta Temba is a cake maker and decorator. She is also the owner and founder of Kanta Kakes – cake shop.
You can find her work on www.kantakakes.com. Follow her on twitter @KantaKakes and Instagram @KantaTemba.
Core Submissions in the Draft Constitution are intact-Justice Minister
Minister of Justice Ngosa Simbyakula has dispelled assertions that Government was going against submissions made by the people in the draft constitution.
Debating the clause on the provincial assemblies, Dr Simbyakula said core submissions that entrench democracy and legitimacy such as the majoritarian rule, dual citizenships and running mate clauses are intact.
“The arguments are mere politicking and playing to the gallery. Let’s put in place that which is feasible economically. We don’t want our people to be meeting under trees. Let’s deal with issues that are at the heart of the Zambian people.”
“We have said that let this issue pend because we have a re-look and see how best we can effect it…we must set out priorities. Zambians have identified provisions that will entrench democracy and legitimacy…we need to do it methodically. Let’s look at it and fine-tune it,” Dr Simbyakula said.
And Shiwang’andu member of Parliament Stephen Kampyongo wondered why some members were supporting the clause, which they opposed in their submission to the technical committee on the constitution.
He said MPs had a moral imperative to be consistent as representatives of the people.
Choma Council Engineers certified certified unfinished projects on CDF
CHOMA Municipal Council engineers have been taken to task for
allegedly certifying completion of unfinished projects under the
Constituency Development Fund (CDF).
UPND Mbabala Constituency Member of Parliament Ephraim Bbelemu, on
Monday at a council meeting, castigated the engineers for certifying
that construction of Namuhila dam in Mbabala ward, at a cost of
K70,000 was completed, when in fact not.
The visibly angered MP claimed that certification of incomplete
projects citing the Namuhila dam funded under CDF, was tantamount to
fraud.
“Don’t run a council on a desk and indicate that projects are being
completed, you must visit these projects and get first-hand
information, “he said.
Mbabala and Choma Constituencies, receive K1.4 million each from
Government’s disbursement of CDF annually.
Mr Bbelemu admonished the engineers for allegedly making no attempts
to inspect CDF projects in areas of implementation.
“Anybody who wants to abuse CDF, we shall sort each other and I want
measures to be taken on these officers who are certifying incomplete
projects without seeing them, “he said.
He also castigated the council management for allegedly not monitoring
CDF projects and wondered how it could work if given a K10 billion
project.
He said the law enforcement agencies should take interest in the
manner CDF projects were being implemented.
His Choma Central counterpart, Cornelius Mweetwa described this year’s
use of CDF on community projects in his area as being disastrous.
He was not happy that some projects in the constituency, had delayed
to complete due to wrong building materials procured citing door
flames bought to upgrade Mbole health centre.
He said, Government should not always be blamed on completion of
projects when, in most instances, such delayments were caused by
officers procuring wrong materials.
Town Clerk Timothy Mambalakata said the local authority was doing its
best to ensure CDF projects in various communities were completed in
line with people’s expectations.
Consumer Protection helps consumers get about K400, 000 compensation
THE Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (CCPC) has helped consumers get redress of about K40, 000 from business houses engaging in unfair trading practices in Southern Province over the last six months.
CCPC chief investigator in charge of consumer protection Moses Musantu said the presence of Commission in Southern Province for the last six months had helped consumers get redress amounting to a total of K39, 599.00 of which K28, 980.00 were refunds.
Mr Masantu also said K10, 619.00 were replacements of defective products with the ones that were functioning properly.
He was speaking in Livingstone on Wednesday at Chrismar Hotel during the CCPC organised inception workshop for head teachers in Southern Province.
Head teachers from Livingstone, Kazungula, Kalomo and Zimba districts as well as some journalists from the Livingstone Press Club attended the meeting which was hosted to share knowledge regarding Government’s competition and consumer protection policy which is key to every citizen.
“I would like to share with you some successes that the commission has scored since establishing its provincial office for southern province in April, 2015.
“The presence of CCPC in the province for the last six months has helped consumers get redress amounting to a total of K39, 599.00 of which K28, 980.00 were refunds and K10, 619.00 were replacements of defective products with the ones that were functioning properly. This is the monetary value of goods and services consumers would have lost had it not been for the intervention of the commission,” Mr Musantu said.
He said the Commission had also conducted sensitisation activities in all the districts in the province as well as radio and television (TV) programmes.
Equally, CCPC has brought positive change in the conduct of some of the business players who previously had no regard for consumer rights.
The Commission in June 2015 hosted a media and business stakeholders workshop in Livingstone which was aimed at enlightening the identified stakeholder’s about the competition and consumer protection law and policy.
He said the Commission has also been conducting regular inspections on trading premises so as to check out for expired products as well as no return no refund notices which are against the law.
“As we head towards the festive season, we urge the consumers to take time to check for expiring dates as well as getting receipts for any purchase so that they could be used as evidence in an event that they have been sold an expired or defective product by the trader.
“We also wish to advise the traders to desist from misleading consumers in buying products that are almost expiring or already expired. In an event that there is a promotion of a product, the commission is advising traders to fully disclose to consumers that the products are being reduced due to them nearing expiring. This will enable the consumers to make well informed decisions,” Mr Masantu said.
Zambia Development Agency to Decentralise
THE Zambia Development Agency (ZDA) is set to launch a new strategic plan to outline among other key areas, implementation of its decentralisation policy.
The agency is mandated to among other areas, foster economic growth and development in Zambia through promoting trade and investment, and coordinated private-sector led economic development strategy.
ZDA director General Patrick Chisanga said in Choma on Wednesday that the agency would unveil its comprehensive strategic plan next month.
Mr Chisanga said, when he called on deputy Southern Province Permanent Secretary Douglas Ngimbu, that the new plan would highlight ZDA’s decentralisation policy in line with the Government’s desire.
“ZDA is not represented in most provinces and Government is emphasising on the decentralisation policy, so we are launching a new strategic plan next month to outline key areas such as implementation of this decentralisation policy by the agency, “he said.
Through the decentralisation policy, he said it would enable ZDA set up more offices in provincial town such as Choma to bring services closer to communities.
The policy would help accelerate the marketing of local investment opportunities to local and foreign investors thereby creating jobs.
On the other hand, the strategic plan, would outline more investment opportunities, enterprise development, trade and exports, and the Public Private Partnership (PPP
Mr Chisanga said ZDA was focusing on empowering the Zambian people through enterprise development aimed at promoting the growth of local enterprises through capacity building, business and market linkages.
He said Zambia has rich areas of investment citing priority sectors such as manufacturing, tourism, agriculture, energy, and mining industry.
Earlier, Mr Ngimbu said the province was in need of investors because each district had more untapped investment opportunities which could help in local job creation.
People issuing statements against MMD are imposters-Mbulakulima
We wish to inform the Zambian public that some statements recently released in the media by Mr Moses Mumba, Mr Obby Mwansa, Ms Faustina Sinyangwe and Mr George Kangwa who are purporting to be Movement for Multiparty Democracy (MMD) party officials are a clear case of impersonation of our real party office bearers and this is an offence under Zambian law.
Mr Mumba is claiming to be our Copperbelt Chairman, Mr Mwansa claims to be Copperbelt Province Secretary, Ms Sinyangwe the National Women’s Chairperson and Mr Kangwa the Central Province Vice-Chairman. Mr Kangwa was expelled from the MMD last year and worked with the Patriotic Front (PF) in the January 2015 election. Ms Sinyangwe was expelled on 31st January 2015 with 19 others.
Mr Mumba was Copperbelt Chairman in 2005 under Levy Mwanawasa and became PF Provincial Chairman in 2006 after defecting from MMD. Mr Mumba was succeeded by Mr Terence Findlay, Charles Chilambwe, Peter Zulu and Denson Chisunka in that order. So how can Mr Mumba claim to be the Copperbelt Chairman today, ten year later? And Mr Mwansa has never been the MMD Copperbelt Secretary.
We wish to officially inform all media houses and the public and our Copperbelt Chair is Mr Denson Chisunka. Our Copperbelt Acting Provincial Secretary is Peter Phiri who is also the Information and Publicity Secretary. Our National Women’s Chair is Lisa Passi. Anyone else speaking on behalf of MMD other than our confirmed party officials is an impostor. Anything they say, no matter how believable it sounds, should be ignored.
We wish to remind our friends in the media to make it a habit of always requesting for a reaction from us when they receive controversial statements concerning our party as per journalism ethics. By just publishing statements without fact-checking them, the media inadvertently become conduits of incorrect information to the public. Had we been contacted over the statements by the aforementioned impostors, we would have set the record straight. (See our contact details below).
Finally, we wish to put it on record that some of these people who are attempting to bring confusion in MMD do not have the interests of the party at heart and should be ignored by all genuine members of the party. Our party officials shall henceforth be on the lookout for impostors who we shall not hesitate to have cautioned or arrested by the Police.
We shall decisively deal with any trouble-makers within our ranks who cause trouble. I shall use the powers vested in my office to suspend them and the Disciplinary Committee shall swiftly deal with their cases and the National Executive Committee shall thereafter ratify any recommendations.
It is time we focus and prepare for the 2016 Elections.
Mwansa Mbulakulima
MMD National Secretary
MMD Secretariat
Plot 44/1B Kasala Road (Off Kudu Road & Alick Nkhata Avenue)
Private Bag E365
Kabulonga
Lusaka
Almost entire Zambia plunged into darkness
Almost the entire Zambia is in darkness after a fault at Kariba dam caused the tripping of Kariba South-Kariba North tie line.
Energy Minister Dora Siliya confirmed that the outage which started around 23 Hours on Thursday has affected all provinces except for western and southern provinces which are supplied through the Victoria Falls power station.
The blackout was experienced even at key institutions such as the University Teaching Hospital, Levy Mwanawasa Hospital and the University of Zambia.
The blackout led to some UNZA students protesting outside the Great East road campus, blocking traffic and stoning some vehicles that were passing by.
‘We lost power supply to entire country except for Western and Southern provinces after the tripping of Kariba South-Kariba North tie line which was carrying our imports of about 560 MW. This triggered the trippings of generators at kariba north and later Kafue gorge on overload. Restoration is in progress and Lusaka should be back on supply in next 30 minutes,’ Ms Siliya said.
However, around 05 Hours on Friday morning, most parts of Lusaka and Zambia were still in darkness.