Zambian Chronicle

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APA-Lusaka (Zambia) The Zambian opposition Patriotic Front (PF) party has taken legal action against the country’s national broadcaster, the Zambia National Broadcasting Corporation (ZNBC), for refusing to air the party’s political advertisements, APA learnt here Tuesday.

Political parties have been using various means to reach voters and this has included placing advertisements in both the public and private electronic and print media.

The PF has been running several advertisements on ZNBC which has a wide coverage across the country.

PF president Michael Sata, however, alleged that the ZNBC has stopped airing his party’s advertisements which was unfair, considering that the organisation is a public broadcaster and obliged by law to give equal access to everyone.

A ZNBC spokesman denied the allegation and claimed that the PF advertisements had been suspended because the political party had not paid for the advertisements despite several reminders.

She said that following a part payment from the PF, the broadcaster would resume running the advertisements.

ZNBC has been criticised for what many have termed as bias in favour of the ruling Movement for Multiparty Democracy party for both news coverage and running of political ads.

Another organisation called Anti Rigging Zambia has also sued the national broadcaster for biased coverage of news in favour of the MMD.
 
 
MC/nm/APA 
2008-10-21
 
 
African Press Agency – Copyright upon prior authorization

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LUSAKA (Reuters) – The World Bank agreed on Tuesday to a $75.5 million facility with Zambia to boost electricity generation and said the mineral-rich country required up to $2 billion to meet growing power demand.

Kapil Kapoor, the World Bank country manager for Zambia, signed the deal with Zambia’s Finance Minister Ng’andu Magande. Kapoor said 18,000 new households would be connected to the national power grid.

Only 20 percent of Zambia’s 12 million people have access to power and only three percent of those are in rural areas, government data showed.

The government plans to raise access to power to 50 percent of the population by 2030.

Kapoor said there was increasing demand for power in Zambia due to new copper mines and increased economic activity.

The cash will help build smaller hydro power stations, transmission and distribution of power facilities.

Kapoor said some $33 million of the total amount would be funded by the International Development Association of the World Bank.

Officials say Zambia has up to 1,650 megawatts generation capacity but currently generates only 1,400 megawatts of power as a result of a breakdown of some equipment.

© Reuters 2008. All Rights Reserved.

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Listen to report on cervical cancer detection in Zambia – Download (MP3) 
Listen to report on cervical cancer detection in Zambia – Listen (MP3) 

The World Health Organization says Zambia and Tanzania have the highest incidence of cancer of the cervix in Africa. From Lusaka, Zambia, Voice of America English to Africa Service reporter Danstan Kaunda says the two countries have established a joint team to help with its early detection and treatment.

Doctors at the largest public health institution in Zambia, the University Teaching Hospital, diagnose more than two thousand cases of cervical cancer each year. Most of them die.

Medical experts attribute cervical cancer in part, to immune systems weakened by HIV. Smoking also may be a cause. Medical professionals think more Zambian women are at risk since the country has over three million women over 15 years of age.

Dr Swebby Macha is a cervical cancer specialist at the University Teaching Hospital. He says the joint team is working on creating preventive and treatment strategies in the two countries.

They will begin with simple and inexpensive screening methods that do not require laboratories. The team will also look at inexpensive tools that will test for cervical cancer in rural areas.

One basic low-cost clinical screening program that has worked successfully uses vinegar to detect the cancer.

Dr. Macha says women can do cancer screening themselves at home:

“It is a simple five-minute procedure, where vinegar can be applied to the cervix by a woman herself. Those cells of the cervix that are developing early cancer turn white. In such a case, we send a woman to do further testing at the health institution. And indeed, if it is confirmed cancer, then we burn off or freeze the cells.”

Thirty percent of all detected cases of cancer in Zambia are considered to be serious and require surgery. Other cases are fatal.

But widespread screening for cancer in most African countries is difficult to achieve, partly because of the poorly functioning health-care system.

And there is a problem regarding experts in examining microscopic cells. Dr. Macha says, “There are shortages of lab experts called cytologists in the country – even for us at UTH [University Teaching Hospital] we only have one cytologist expert. So we are trying to establish [a] cytologist school in the country. ”                   

A report by the US-based Johns Hopkins Program for International Education in Gynecology and Obstetrics offers another reason for the deaths caused by cervix cancer: many African countries do not consider screening a top health priority.

Zambia has the second highest incidence of cancer of the cervix in the sub-Saharan region and sixth highest in the world.

Source: Voice of America

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LUSAKA—Zambia’s government has frozen financing for all non-essential projects and may delay further cuts to fuel taxes to keep its budget deficit below two percent of GDP, Finance Minister Ng’andu Magande said on Tuesday.

The copper-rich southern African nation has been financially squeezed by the global financial crisis, which has led to a drop in commodities prices and reduced investor interest in emerging markets in Africa and elsewhere.

Magande told journalists in Lusaka the government would only release funds for road construction and other infrastructure projects that were seen as critical to the development of the economy.

“It simply means that for other projects, we are not going to release funds the ministries needed (and) they have to live within the budget,” Magande said.

Zambia’s government had hoped to keep its deficit this year to 1.2 percent of GDP, but it conceded last month that it would not reach that target.

The belt-tightening flies in the face of a proposal made by acting President Rupiah Banda to push through additional reductions on fuel import taxes, lowering the cost of petrol.

Banda is running in an Oct. 30 presidential election to succeed former President Levy Mwanawasa, who died in France in August following a stroke.

Banda’s government already has cut import duties on fuel and raised the amount of fertiliser subsidies for poor farmers. Opposition leader Michael Sata has described the moves as a ploy to win votes.

Magande, however, said that Zambians might have to wait until next year for another drop in the price of petrol.

“When we cut fuel prices in June, we suffered a loss of 120 billion kwacha ($31.1 million). This is good because less tax means there will be more economic activity, but I have to find money somewhere to cover the loss,” Magande said.

The bad news was partly offset by the World Bank’s announcement on Monday that it would provide $75.5 million to boost electricity generation in the mineral-rich country, which is facing a power crisis.

Kapil Kapoor, the Bank’s country manager for Zambia, said 18,000 additional households would be connected to the national grid as a result of the funding. He noted, however, that Zambia would need up to $2 billion to meet growing power demand from industrial and residential customers.

Only 20 percent of Zambia’s 12 million people have access to power and only three percent of those are in rural areas, according to the government. It has targetted raising access to electricity to 50 percent of the population by 2030.

Officials say Zambia has up to 1,650 megawatts of generation capacity but currently produces only 1,400 megawatts of power due to problems with aging power stations and transmission lines.

Source: Epoch Times