The Unemployment Association of Zambia (UAZ) says statutory regulation of the media is detrimental to Zambia’s budding democracy.

Association president Mpundu Mwanamwelwa told ZANIS in Lusaka today that there is need for Press Freedom if democracy is to flourish in country.

Mr. Mwanamwelwa said statutory regulation would inhibit journalists and restrict the free flow of information.

He said impeding the media to carry out their set mandate would be to the detriment of the country as the role of the press as a watch-dog would be defeated.

Mr. Mwanamwelwa further said economic achievement and true democracy are elements that can not survive without divergence views which are brought forward through the media.

Mr. Mwanamwelwa said statutory regulation of the media would bar divergent views from being heard.

He said this scenario would impact negatively on the promotion of good governance and the fight against bad vices such as corruption.

Mr. Mwanamwelwa has since urged the public to condemn efforts aimed at bringing about statutory regulation of the media.

Government has said that media houses in the country have failed to regulate themselves and this had prompted the calls from various stakeholders for statutory regulation.

Chief Government spokesperson, Ronnie Shikapwasha has said that the failure by the media to regulate themselves was blatantly exhibited in the period running to the October 30 presidential election.

He challenged the Media Council of Zambia (MECOZ), Press Association of Zambia (PAZA), Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) and the Zambia Union of Journalists (ZUJ), among others, to prove that the media could regulate themselves.

Recently, members of Parliament (MPs) and the Government called for statutory regulation of the media following what they termed as unprofessional reporting in the period of campaigning for the October 30 polls.

On Monday, media bodies rejected calls by the Government for statutory regulation, saying the decision was misplaced and made out of emotions.

ENDS/VP/AM/ZANIS

North-Western Province Permanent Secretary, Jeston Mulando, has called for extensive capacity building in local authorities to enable them effectively implement the planning system.

Mr Mulando said consultations on the review of special planning registration in Zambia, revealed that there are a lot of capacity gaps at lower levels within the planning system.

He said for instance, there are too few planning inspectors and land administrators.

Mr Mulando said this in a speech read for him by his Deputy, Nkolola Hazemba, during a one-day provincial stakeholder consultative forum on the draft regional and urban Planning Bill in Solwezi today.

He, however, said it was gratifying to note that the proposed legislation tries to strike a balance between creating a system that could be implemented now by the current capacity, whilst ensuring that officials and other stakeholders strive to improve that capacity in the future.

Mr Mulando, further, noted that the application of the town and country planning Act is more biased to state owned land excluding customary tenure.

He said such a biased state of affairs has resulted into a lopsided nature of development in the country with state land which constituted only six percent of the land in the country receiving more development focus and investments at the expense of the rural areas.

Mr. Mulando said as a result the draft bill has a provision proposing for harmonising the role of both government and the traditional leaders in dealing with development in rural areas.

ZANIS/WEN/EML/ENDS/SJK

President, Rupiah Banda, has arrived in Abuja, Nigeria for a two-day official visit.

President Banda touched down at Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport at 17 hours local time.

He is accompanied by Foreign Affairs Minister, Kabinga Pande and his counterpart at Energy and Water Affairs Minister, Kenneth Konga, and some other senior government officials .

The President was welcomed by Nigerian Foreign Affairs Minister, Ojo Maduekwem, Zambian High Commissioner to that country Godfrey Musonda, his deputy, Richard Kachingwe, and Zambians living in Nigeria.

President Banda is tomorrow expected to hold private talks with his Nigerian counterpart President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua before returning to Lusaka in the afternoon.

President Banda’s visit to Nigeria has raised expectations of strengthening bilateral ties for the economic and social development of the two countries.

Zambian High Commissioner to Nigeria, Godfrey Musonda, yesterday held that President Banda has shown determination to use bilateral relations existing between Zambian and Nigeria to attract more investment from west Africa for the economic benefit of the national economy.

Mr Musonda indicated that Nigerian financial institutions, among them the Access Bank, UBA and Eco Bank have since negotiated to open business in Zambia, adding that more potential investors have expressed intetrest to work with Zambian businesses in various economic development programmes.

Copperbelt University Professor John Lungu has urged Zambians to stop worrying about the decline in copper prices because it is a passing phase.

Speaking during an Economics Association of Zambia public discussion in Kitwe on Monday evening, Prof Lungu said Zambians should not worry because economies of India and China were growing.

Prof Lungu said it was important that Zambia handled the copper sector with care because the country’s economy was largely dependant on it.

MUZ president, Rayford Mbulu said 286 miners at Bwana Mkubwa Mine had lost their jobs and were due to get their terminal benefits today, while 50 other miners at Kansanshi were likely to lose their jobs. He said 26 other workers at Chambishi Metals slag dump had been sent on forced leave, but that reasons given for the job cuts were not justifiable.

Mr Mbulu wondered why mines should retrench workers when the current copper prices were more than double what they used to be in the past.

He said mines must remember that when copper prices were fetching US$10,000, they did very little for the communities in which they operated.

Mr Mbulu said there was no justification for mines to retrench miners because they had already made huge profits.

Mr Mbulu said there was need for the Government’s intervention in the matter as the union believed that the situation needed political will.

Mines Minister, Maxwell Mwale, says the job cuts at Bwana Mkubwa mine are not related to the fall in copper prices caused by the global financial crisis.

Mr. Mwale says Bwana Mkubwa mine has been experiencing operational challenges because it no longer processes copper ore from the Democractic Republic of Congo which has banned copper ore exports.

He said this in an interview with ZNBC news in Lusaka.

Mr. Mwale has appealed to mine investors not to send the industry into panic because copper prices are still favourable.

Universty of Zambia (UNZA) head of mining engineering, Mathias Mpande has also called on mining companies not to retrench workers on the basis of falling copper prices or the global economic recession.

Dr Mpande said in an interview in Lusaka yesterday that there was no need for retrenchments because mining companies in Zambia would continue operating profitably despite the falling copper prices and global economic recession.

Dr Mpande said by the time most of the firms came to invest into the country, prices of copper were very high and, as such, the companies made huge profits to warrant them to continue their operations.

“The mines are going to still remain profitable. Mopani, for example, has made large investments. By the time they were investing everything was on their side and they have made profits to continue operating even in the face of global economic crisis.

“I cannot see any mine closing down because there is enough copper. A mine can only close if there is no copper or it is not happy with the prevailing Government policies but not because of the global economic recession,” Dr Mpande said.

He said if any mining company in the country were to close, it would do so because it wanted to and not that it was not profitable to remain in existence owing to the global economic crunch.

With the case of Zambia, he said, possibilities of mines closing owing to the economic crunch were minimal because Chinese and Indian investors whose countries were not adversely affected by the global economic recession mostly owned them.

“India and China are not going to go under and so most of the mines on the Copperbelt will still be profitable,” Dr Mpande said.

He, however, advised the Government to come to the aid of mining companies by offering them some incentives.

He said, Government could, for example, exempt some mining firms from paying certain taxes until such a time that copper prices and the global economy stabilised.

Dr Mpande said the trend the world over had been that governments assisted the running of mining firms by offering them tax exemptions.

He said with Chinese and Indian economies remaining buoyant, the Government could enter into an agreement to directly export copper concentrates to the two countries to secure jobs for citizens working in the mines.

Dr Mpande said it was not too late for the Government to start negotiating with its counterparts in the two countries so that direct export of copper concentrates to China and India could start.

Times of Zambia/ZNBC