A combined team of Council Police and Drug Enforcement Commission (DEC) Officers yesterday swung into action to remove street kids around the Central Business District in Kapiri Mposhi.

And the Department of Social Welfare has threatened to prosecute parents of the children caught up in the dragnet for child neglect and failure to provide for their children.

This follows a spate of car breakings where property such as laptops and money has been stolen from vehicles parked around the area by suspected street kids.

The team rounded up 20 suspected street kids aged between nine and 19 years in an operation around Shoprite and Choppies supermarkets.

Kapiri Mposhi Town Council Public Relations Officer, Nelly Nkolongo says the operation was conducted to bring sanity to the Central Business District after complaints of thefts, drug abuse and criminal activities involving street kids.

Ms. Nkolongo revealed that the team recovered harmful smoking substances commonly known as “Bostick” from the apprehended street kids.

“Concerns were raised on the activities of street kids around the CBD and the local authority responded to restore sanity … this will be a routine operation to rid the streets of these children and see how they can be re-integrated into school with the help of the social welfare department and Ministry of education,” Ms. Nkolongo said.

Meanwhile, the Social Welfare Department has threatened to prosecute parents of the affected children for child neglect if they allow their children to go back to the streets.

This is after it was discovered that all the 19 out of the 20 apprehended children were coming from homes of their parents.

Kapiri Mposhi District Assistant Social Welfare Officer, Kelvin Munyama says the parents who were summoned and made to sign Commitment to Care Agreements were reminded that it was their responsibility to take care of their children.

Mr Munyama explained that under provisions of Section 169 of the Penal Code Chapter 87 of the Laws of Zambia, a parent commits an offence for failing to provide for the child.

“We made an assessment which revealed that these children are actually coming from homes and have parents so we tracked and summoned their parents whom we have cautioned to the effect that they risk being prosecuted for neglecting their children and have since signed Commitment to Care agreements to resume supporting their children,” Mr. Munyama said.

Mr Munyama said the Department of Social Welfare has since initiated a counseling regime for the affected children and respective parents to ensure that the children do not go back to the streets.

He added that his department will engage stakeholders and the Ministry of Education to facilitate the re-admission into school of children who had stopped school.

“ Both parents and respective children have been linked to counseling services through Social Welfare and several stakeholder organizations in the district on various problems presented as having been the cause of their being found on the streets and DEBS will be engaged to ensure that children who are not in school for various reasons are re-admitted,” Mr Munyama said.

The National Union of Public and Private Educators of Zambia (NUPPEZ) in Nakonde district in Muchinga province has called on government to upgrade already serving teachers in the precise salary scales.

Nakonde NUPPEZ District Secretary, Benny Chishatama said the elevation should be considered in the 2021-2022 budget which is yet to be presented soon.

Mr. Chishatama who was speaking in an interview with ZANIS in Nakonde today, stated that despite advancing their studies, a number of teachers are still under incorrect salary scales.

“The union is aware of the fact that a lot of teachers have upgraded in Nakonde district as well as the nation at large who are place in wrong salary scale,” he said.

He bemoaned that the circumstance which is quite demotivating might lead to low productivity among teachers.

“Actually it is very frustrating and as a result teachers cannot work nicely or accordingly. There is nothing to encourage us to put in our best,” he said.

Mr. Chishatama further appealed to the new government to first upgrade teachers who are already in service before recruiting new ones so that no one feels left out.

“It is very painful to see a new entrant being put in the right salary scale when you as a serving teacher who upgraded and graduated 5 years ago are still in salary F or G. Therefore the union is pleading to the the New Dawn government to create PMEC vacancies for new entrants by first upgrading already serving teachers,’ he said.

He pointed out that it is saddening to see their hard earned academic papers being destroyed by termites before they can even get a raise.

“Most of the teachers are self-sponsored who struggled to upgrade and their Bachelor’s Degrees and Masters are now being eaten by termites in the cabinets.”

Mr. Chishatama, however, added that the union has trust that the new regime will bring sanity in the education sector and thereby improve service delivery.

Kitwe City council Town Clerk Mbulo Seke says the council will next week start arresting and prosecuting people buying merchandise from undesignated trading places in an effort to curb street vending.

The Town Clerk says the move is in view of the observed unhealthy customer behaviour of preferring to buy from streets instead designated trading places, and also recent announcement by Local government and Rural Development Minister Garry Nkombo that the State will not tolerate street vending.

Mr. Seke observed that the preference by customers to buy from the streets is what is promoting street vending, street littering and loss of revenue in the markets.

“Under the law, any person found buying goods or merchandise from undesignated places or streets shall be liable on conviction to a fine of 666.67 penalty units or K200,” Mr. Seke said.

And Mr. Seke has stated that the council has secured 841 trading stands that are on offer to traders in Chisokone market.

He said priority will be given to the street vendors operating from Independence Avenue, Matuka Avenue, Obote, Kabelenga, Enos Chomba, Langashe and Chisokone One Way.

He further explained that the deadline for registration and allocation of the available market spaces is Monday 11th October 2021 at 17:00 hours.

“The Local Authority has secured 340 stands in Chisokone B market shelters, 30 stands at the Green market, 21 stands at Olympic and 450 stands at Chisokone A, making a total of 841 spaces available in Chisokone market alone against a self-imposed street vending population of 819,” Mr Seke explained.

Mr. Seke warned that those who will be found selling on the streets when there are spaces available in the market after the deadline will be taken to court.

Two weeks ago during the installation of Kitwe Mayor Mpasa Mwaya, Local government and Rural Development Minister Garry Nkombo warned that government will not tolerate street vending but he instructed the council to first avail trading spaces to those trading on the street after which the law should take its cause on those that will not comply.

WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook have all gone down in a major outage.

The three apps – which are owned by Facebook and run on shared infrastructure – all completely stopped working shortly before 5pm. Other products that are part of the same family of apps, such as Facebook Workplace, also stopped working.

Visitors to the Facebook website simply saw an error page or a message that their browser could not connect. The WhatsApp and Instagram apps continued to work, but did not show new content, including any messages sent or received during the problems.

Me: WhatsApp , Facebook and Instagram are down

Professor: That’s where Lusakatimes comes in

United Party for National Development (UPND) youths in the Copperbelt province have been urged to remain calm following the suspension of mining activities at the dumpsite.

UPND Copperbelt youth chairperson Daniel Kamenga said the suspension of mining activities at the dumpsite is meant to allow government to put in place a proper system.

Mr. Kamenga regretted that there were a lot of illegalities at the dumpsite during the PF regime.

He said once a proper mining system is put in place, the young people in Copperbelt province will benefit more from the dumpsite.

He has since urged youths in the Copperbelt province to form and register cooperatives.

Mr. Kamenga said forming of cooperatives will bring about sanity at the mining dumpsite.

He was speaking during a press briefing held at the UPND party secretariat today.

And speaking at the same briefing, Lusaka UPND youth chairperson Anderson Banda said youths are proud and happy with the way government has started rolling out developmental programmes.

Mr. Banda predicted that in the next four years, Zambia is going to a prosperous country.

He said people will regret for not having put President Hakainde Hichilema in office early.

Mr. Banda has since assured the youths that the country is in safe hands as President Hichilema is putting measures in place to ensure that Zambia’s economy is back on right trajectory.

Meanwhile, Mr. Banda said the youths in the province will continue rallying behind the leadership of President Hichilema.

He stressed that the aspirations of youths is for the UPND to deliver on the promises it made to the people prior to the August 12 general elections.

President Hakainde Hichilema says his new administration wants to improve the country’s electoral environment to make it transparent to all players.

President Hichilema said the move will be coupled with ensuring respect of the rule of law and human rights.

The Head of State was speaking at State House in Lusaka today where he conferred with the European Union (EU) Delegation.

“You can trust us that, we would like to improve the electoral environment in this country so that we learn of the negatives of the past and amongst those is really the respect for the rule of law to make sure that the elections are carried out within the environment of the rule of law,” the President said.

President Hichilema stated that Zambia appreciates the EU support in promoting democracy in the country through various election observer activities during elections over the years.

“We are really delighted as a country, we appreciate the warm cordial relationship between Zambia and the EU over the years,” he said.

The Head of State further said the work of the EU mission in Zambia during the 2016 elections were of benefit to the nation and also had positive impact on the 2021 elections.

President Hichilema said he is hopeful that the visit of EU Chief Observer Maria Urqurza, in November this year will help deal with some of the issues that are still outstanding in the country’s electoral process.

And EU Delegation Leader, Rita Laranjinha noted that the democratic credentials of Zambia are an inspiration for Africa.

Ms. Laranjinha who is the Managing Director of Africa and the European External Action Service added that the EU is certain that Zambia’s success will also be the success of Africa as a continent.

“Your success, we are certain that they will be the success of Africa and because of that we wish you all the best. We want to make sure that we can build on solid grounds this new chapter of our relation. We are very much counting on the very good work that our delegation is already doing on the ground,” she said.

Ms. Laranjinha said the recent elections have opened the possibility of a new and promising chapter for EU operations and bilateral relations between the EU and Zambia.

She further congratulated the Zambian people for the peaceful general elections and transition of power.