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/ 22 January 2008
Zambia was hit by a new nationwide power failure late on Monday, the second in 48 hours. The entire country was plunged into darkness at about 5.30pm GMT and partial supplies were only restored on Tuesday to critical areas, such as hospitals and military installations, said Rhodnie Sisala, managing director of the state-run Zambia Electricity Supply Company.
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/ 22 January 2008
Jerry Mweemba, an 82-year-old farmer, stoically chews on his pipe as he surveys the line of grass-thatched huts waist-high in brown rainwater in Zambia’s impoverished Mazabuka region. ”Initially, we thought it was the usual rains until we realised that water was entering into our homes,” says Mweemba from under the shade of a large acacia tree.
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/ 21 January 2008
A nationwide power blackout in Zambia cut copper and cobalt production at some mines, damaging mining equipment and temporarily trapping hundreds of miners underground. State media reported nearly 300 miners on night shifts at units of KCM and Mopani Copper Mines were temporarily trapped in shafts for hours.
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/ 18 January 2008
Zambia has declared a national disaster after floods swept through the Southern African nation and several neighbouring countries, killing at least 45 people and destroying roads, bridges, crops and livestock. ”This is a national disaster and it requires concerted efforts of all of us to solve,” Zambian President Levy Mwanawasa said late on Thursday.
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/ 13 January 2008
Zambia have dropped unfit striker Collins Mbesuma and veteran defender Elijah Tana from their final 23-man squad for the African Cup of Nations finals. Mbesuma, who plays in Turkey and was formerly, played last week in a friendly against Tunisia but was deemed too out of shape for the tournament in Ghana.
Floods in Southern Africa have displaced thousands of people, drowned livestock and put large numbers of children at risk from serious disease, officials said on Tuesday. About 1,5-million Zambians may have to flee their homes.
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/ 31 December 2007
Zambia’s state telephone utility will spend about -million to lay a fibre-optic network and to lift its cellphone subscription to one million customers by June 2008, its managing director said. Simon Tembo said Cell-Z, a subsidiary of the state-owned Zamtel, hoped to increase its cellphone subscriber base from the current 300 000.
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/ 18 December 2007
Human Rights Watch (HRW) Tuesday accused Zambia’s government of failing to stop escalating violence against women and prevention of access to antiretroviral treatment for people living with HIV/Aids. HRW said 17% of Zambia’s adult population is living with HIV and 57% of them are women.
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/ 2 December 2007
Zambia President Levy Mwanawasa has urged the British prime minister to continue speaking out against Zimbabwe until a solution is found to the country’s crises, media reported on Sunday. Mwanawasa welcomed the pressure Gordon Brown was putting on Harare but expressed disappointment at his boycott of next weekend’s European Union-Africa summit.
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/ 29 November 2007
The head of Zambia’s powerful drug-busting unit has been arrested and charged with stealing public funds and abuse of office for allegedly pocketing money confiscated from culprits, an official said on Thursday. Ryan Chitoba was arrested on Wednesday by the Anti-Corruption Commission, which has been investigating him for the past six months.
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/ 20 November 2007
Zambian President Levy Mwanawasa has granted amnesty to almost 400 convicts in a bid to decongest his country’s disease-infested prisons, an official announced on Tuesday. Mwanawasa amnestied 14 prisoners who were on life sentences and 379 others who were serving various jail terms, a prisons official, Daniel Chiwela, said.
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/ 11 November 2007
Zambia has temporarily withdrawn the passport of opposition leader Michael Sata, an arch-critic of Lusaka’s key ally Beijing who has been lobbying against the Chinese juggernaut in Africa, a minister said on Saturday. He told reporters that Sata’s passport was withdrawn with immediate effect to allow a probe.
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/ 10 October 2007
Zambian President Levy Mwanawasa has warned the opposition and civic groups that they will face treason charges if they reject his government’s plans to amend the Constitution, state media reported on Wednesday. ”President Mwanawasa says people daring his government over the National Constitution Conference (NCC) will be arrested for treason,” ZNBC radio said.
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/ 12 September 2007
A controversial document criticising Britain over the crisis in Zimbabwe, which was leaked at a Southern African regional summit last month, came from Harare, not South Africa, a senior Zambian official said on Wednesday. Media reports said South Africa blamed Britain for the deepening crisis in Zimbabwe.
Zambian President Levy Mwanawasa and his Malawian counterpart launched a long-delayed joint rail project on Saturday that is expected to help boost trade in Southern Africa, state radio said. Mwanawasa said the venture will connect his landlocked nation to the coast of Mozambique through Malawi.
The new chairperson of the Southern African Development Community (SADC), Zambian President Levy Mwanawasa, is prioritising the setting up of a free trade area (FTA) by next year, reports said on Wednesday. As the dust settles after a hectic SADC summit, Trade and Commerce Minister Felix Mutat has placed the establishment of the FTA on top of the agenda.
Zambian Finance Minister Ng’andu Magande thinks there may be only one way to influence defiant Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe — enlist the help of liberation giants like Nelson Mandela. Magande’s comments were tacit recognition that Southern African Development Community leaders failed during their meeting last week.
Southern African leaders failed on Friday to heed calls for strong action against the embattled Zimbabwean government, saying the ailing country’s problems are ”exaggerated”. ”We feel they [Zimbabwe] will solve their economic problems,” the chairperson of the Southern African Development Community told journalists.
Southern African leaders launched a peacekeeping brigade on Friday as part of a planned African standby force to be deployed on peace missions and to tackle disarmament and humanitarian crises on the continent. Zambian President Levy Mwanawasa officially launched the brigade and inspected troops in front of regional heads of state at a summit.
A two-day summit of Southern African leaders closes in Lusaka, Zambia, on Friday with observers eagerly anticipating word on two reports on efforts to resolve the crisis in neighbouring Zimbabwe. South Africa’s President Thabo Mbeki was due to report to the summit on his efforts to broker a stalemate between Zimbabwe’s ruling Zanu-PF and the opposition.
Zimbabwean leader Robert Mugabe was given a hero’s welcome on Thursday at the opening of a Southern African summit set to be dominated by international concerns over his country’s meltdown. The embattled octogenarian leader received thunderous applause as he walked into the summit of the Southern African Development Community.
Zimbabwe on Thursday rejected the need for political reform in the Southern African nation at a summit of regional leaders that is meant to find ways to ease the country’s political and economic crisis. Southern African Development Community leaders met to consider the crisis in Zimbabwe but the prospects for progress looked slim.
Southern African heads of state begin on Thursday a two-day summit in the Zambian capital, Lusaka, that is likely to be dominated by the crisis in Zimbabwe, which is being felt across the region as Zimbabweans flee the imploding economy at home. President Robert Mugabe arrived in Lusaka on Wednesday afternoon.
Trade and peacekeeping also are on the agenda, but Southern African leaders meeting this week are likely to be preoccupied with the economic and political crises in Zimbabwe that are sending thousands of refugees into neighbouring South Africa, Botswana and Zambia.
Southern African leaders will probably not be able to find a solution to the meltdown in Zimbabwe at their summit meeting in Zambia later this week, and will probably dabble only in diplomatic matters, analysts predict. Few expect concrete results from the Southern African Development Community (SADC) heads of state gathering that starts in Lusaka on Thursday.
Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe is nearing a deal with the opposition to end a political crisis in his country after South Africa tried to broker an agreement, a document obtained by Reuters on Wednesday indicated. A confidential report due to be presented to leaders of the Southern Africa Development Community says ”progress” has been made in talks.
The Zambian government has reiterated its warning to civic groups to drop their plans to stage violent protests during next week’s meeting of regional leaders. The government said in a statement that it had received reports that the groups were planning to hold protests during the Southern African Development Community (SADC) 27th summit.
Zambian immigration authorities are struggling to cope with a sudden upsurge in Zimbabweans crossing the border to shop for basic products as the economic crisis in their home country bites deeper and its coming wheat harvest is expected to be the worst in years.
Former Zambian president Frederick Chiluba may stand trial for corruption by video link due to ill health, a spokesperson for the ex-leader said on Friday. Chiluba, who is due to travel to South Africa for medical treatment, has been told by a Zambian court to return home by August 13 to resume his protracted trial the next day, a spokesperson said.
Zambia’s civil- and trade-union coalition on Wednesday threatened to picket a regional summit next month in Lusaka in protest over the political impasse in their country. The coalition said that it wants the summit of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) next month to discuss the country’s political impasse on the constitution-making process.
Zambian doctors have ordered the ailing ex-president Frederick Chiluba sent to South Africa for treatment after his heart condition deteriorated, a Chiluba spokesperson said on Tuesday. Emmanuel Mwamba said Chiluba would be flown to South Africa after local doctors said he needed immediate specialist treatment.
Zambia has banned the use of an imported HIV/Aids drug that was recently recalled in Europe due to contamination and might seek compensation from the company that manufactures it. Viracept was withdrawn in Europe after drugmaker Roche Holding AG said it had identified a chemical impurity in the product.