About K1.7 billion at the Lusaka City Council (LCC) has allegedly been misused and police and the Anti-Corruption Commission have moved in to investigate the matter.

However, a senior LCC official has been suspended pending investigations.

The council is now seeking a comprehensive forensic audit to trace the money and the culprits in a probe that started when Local Government and Housing Minister Eustarckio Kazonga commissioned a special audit.

This followed reports of irregularities in the PF-run councils.

Lusaka mayor Robert Chikwelete confirmed the alleged misuse of the money and said the council decided to verify reports of financial abuse following a ministerial directive in April this year.

“We have just concluded our internal audit and what I can confirm now is that K1.7 billion has been misused. We wrote the Minister of Local Government, Dr Eustarckio Kazonga last week requesting authority to allow the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) and the police to move in because we suspect more has been stolen,” Mr Chikwelete said.

The mayor said the council had in the interim transferred most of the workers in the finance department to allow investigations to take place smoothly.

The transfers were necessitated by the report of the establishment and audit committees of the council, which are composed of councillors, co-opted members from strategic institutions and senior management officials.

Another statutory audit report has revealed gross mismanagement, misapplication and theft of resources amounting to more than K2.9 billion.

Mr Chikwelete said he would work closely with the minister to ensure development targets were attained.

The statutory audits for 2008/9 revealed gross irregularities in the PF-ran councils and the minister in April gave them a 60-day ultimatum to explain how they would correct the weaknesses in the management of resources.

Dr Kazonga also wanted an account of how they would recover the misapplied money, set up financial regulations and ensure that they spend more money on service provision and less on personal emoluments.

The Common for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) says tremendous progress has been made towards the launch of the regional Customs Union.
The committee on Trade and Customs which met in Zimbabwe recently said the regional bloc agreed on the need for member countries to put in place practical and comprehensive programmes that would speed up the implementation process by the set deadline of 2012.

According to the e-COMESA Newsletter made available, there is progress in key areas and several recommendations have so far been made to ensure that the process is quickened.

The committee has since appealed to member countries that have not joined the Free Trade Area (FTA) to join as soon as possible since COMESA was now a Custom Union.

The meeting also highlighted a few milestones in the area of Non Tariff Barriers (NTBs) further urging focal points in member states to ascertain the report on NTBs and help in eliminating existing NTBs.

With regards to the Customs Union, the committee welcomed the improvement and recommended that member countries needed more time to examine the thresholds for sensitive products.

The meeting also advised the members to quickly submit their list of sensitive products in order for the committee to finalise the study that would be sent to member states before an intergovernmental committee meeting is held in August this year.

On the relationship between the regional integration agenda and multilateral trading system, the committee recommended that there was need to develop analytical work and develop a regional strategy on World Trade Organisation (WTO) issues.

It said this is in order to articulate coherent regional positions therefore reviving the COMESA working group on WTO. The committee further endorsed the initiative of focused training in institutions in member states on regional integration subjects. The meeting was attended by representatives from the 19 COMESA member states and representatives from WTO.

And Malawi offered to host the next meeting of the Committee meeting on Trade and Customs. Zambia is a member of the regional bloc and the country houses its headquarters.

A Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) aimed at promoting international cooperation on cybersecurity has been signed between the Commonwealth Telecommunications Organisation (CTO) and the Malaysia-based International Multilateral Partnership Against Cyber Threats (IMPACT). The document, signed at the end of a two-day Cybersecurity forum in London, paves the way for two organisations to work towards the facilitation of information flow and resources, capacity building and the setting up of robust cybersecurity frameworks for protection against cyber crime.

Under the MOU, both organisations will share and exchange knowledge and information on cybersecurity to enhance each party’s knowledge base. The MOU will also see the cross promotion of capacity-building activities aimed at the public sector, private sector and the civil society, with the objective of finding and exemplifying best practices in cybersecurity.

Besides capacity-building, the MOU will see both organisations provide joint assistance for projects and programmes that will improve cybersecurity, particularly in the less-endowed countries, as well as joint representation to policymakers and regulators to achieve common goals. Through these initiatives, both organisations intend to operationalise strategies and activities that pave the path to minimising risks in an increasingly interconnected online world.

The MOU exchange was represented by Dr. Ekwow Spio-Garbrah, Chief Executive Officer, CTO and Philip Victor, Director of Training Skills Development & Outreach, IMPACT.

Endorsing the agreement, CEO of CTO, Dr Ekwow Spio-Garbrah said, “This MOU is yet another step towards a safer cyber space. Security experts from both the public and private sectors agree that with the advantages of the Internet come a number of threats which require international collaboration to deal with, and at CTO we believe that such MOUs help stakeholders to pool their resources together to help contain these threats.”

According to him, the MOU will also enable IMPACT to potentially use training services of the CTO, including its seminal Programme for Development and Training (PDT) as a delivery channel. With over forty regional training workshops conducted per year, the PDT will open new vistas for IMPACT to broaden its stakeholder engagement.

“This strategic alliance enables both parties to jointly enhance the global cooperation in defending against cyber threats, which have proven to be pervasive in nature, spiking in numbers on a second-by-second basis,” said Mr. Mohd Noor Amin, Chairman, Management Board, IMPACT.

Statistics from IMPACT’s Global Response Centre saw the number of detected global malware attacks rise from about 7 million attacks in January 2008, to almost 35 million attacks in December 2009, an increase of 400%. Malware attacks – short for malicious ware – often try to mine pertinent information from end-users or servers for financial gain. Not surprisingly, networks and computers in the financial services industries were the most targeted, at 71 per cent of globally detected attacks.

Mr. Amin added that IMPACT, through its capacity-building programmes, aims to help constituents of CTO improve their skills to better respond to the dynamic nature of cyber threats.

About IMPACT

The International Multilateral Partnership Against Cyber Threats (IMPACT) is the world’s first comprehensive global partnership against cyber threats. As an international not-for-profit organisation, IMPACT is a politically neutral platform, bringing together governments, academia and industry experts to enhance the global community’s capacity to prevent, defend against and respond to cyber threats.

IMPACT is the pioneer forum that enables all partner countries to collectively take a global leadership role in the interest of their national cybersecurity. Located in Cyberjaya, Malaysia, IMPACT’s Global HQ has been named as the physical and operational home of the International Telecommunication Union’s (ITU) Global Cybersecurity Agenda (GCA). This landmark collaboration provides ITU’s 191 member states with IMPACT’s expertise, facilities and resources to effectively address the world’s most serious cyber threats.

For more information on IMPACT, please visit www.impact-alliance.org.

About CTO

With a history dating back to 1901, the Commonwealth Telecommunications Organisation (CTO) is an international development partnership between the Commonwealth and non-Commonwealth governments, businesses and civil society organisations. CTO provides the international community with effective means to help bridge the digital divide and achieve social and economic development, by delivering to developing countries unique knowledge-sharing programmes in the use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT).

With its headquarters in London and recipient members based in Europe, the Caribbean, Americas, Africa and Asia-Pacific regions, the CTO has been at the centre of continuous and extensive international communications development funding, co-operation and assistance programmes. CTO’s mission is to reduce global poverty through the more efficient utilization of ICTs, and its development agenda reflects the priorities set in the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

MTN Zambia has reduced all international calling tariffs by 40 percent on average after installing its own international gateway.

The mobile cellular phone service provider has reduced calls to some destinations by more than 80 percent, including calls to the fifth most frequently called destinations which are Canada, China, United States of America and India.

This entails that customers will now be able to call these countries from K1,500 per minute.

Company chief executive Farhad Khan said in a statement issued in Lusaka that MTN Zambia is committed to providing superior services, now that it has control of the international gateway.

Last week, the Zambia Information and Communications Technology Authority (ZICTA) gave a go-ahead to mobile cellular phone companie to install their own international gateways.

Mr Khan said tariffs have been significantly reduced across the board, with an average 40 percent discount on current tariffs that subscribers will benefit from immediately.

“MTN Zambia received confirmation from ZICTA on June 14 that we could deploy our own international gateway .On June 18, literally less than a week later, MTN Zambia reduced all international calling rates by an average across the board of 40 percent.

“In the past, we relied entirely on the incumbent to terminate all our international traffic. Due to this, we as MTN Zambia did not have control of the costs and quality associated with international calls,” he said.

For countries such as South Africa, Namibia, Botswana and Tanzania, MTN has reduced call rates by 45 percent during peak calling times when corporate clients are most likely to call.

Government has reduced the licence fees for the international gateway, which was initially pegged at US$12,000, a rate said to be the highest in the region.

He said per second billing applies to all the destinations, which will be an added advantage for the new international calling proposition.

Mr Khan said MTN has consistently championed affordability of mobile tariffs.

MTN said it will continue to champion affordable mobile calls in Zambia, but because of the high cost of inter-connectivity charges, lower rates can be found within its network.

MTN Zambia chief marketing officer Ernst Fonternal last month said the firm had written to ZICTA and the Zambia Competition Commission to look into inter-connectivity charges within Zambia.

ZICTA reportedly responded that PriceWaterHouseCoopers was investigating the inter-connectivity tariffs through a prospectus study, which is expected to be ready this month.

The mobile telephone company assured customers that once the matter is resolved, the public should expect reduced local calling rates from MTN.

THE Zambia International Trade Fair (ZITF) is looking to use this year’s event to market its multi-billion Kwacha redesign plan to local and foreign business houses and property developers, chairperson Phesto Musonda has said.

And more than 630 local and foreign exhibitors have expressed interest to exhibit at this year’s trade fair, although none of the mining companies in the country has registered to participate in the show.

Mr Musonda, who did not disclose the amount required for the project that would be done in phases, said in Ndola yesterday that the show management would work with local and foreign investors to redesign the exhibitors’ halls and main arena, apart from putting up new structures.

The objective of the programme would be to modernise the entire trade fair premises and replace some structures some of which are more than 40 years old.

Mr Musonda said in an interview that the ZITF management would also use this year’s show to promote value addition to Zambian products and the sharing of experiences on how to survive economic recessions.

The theme for the 2010 show, which takes place from June 30 to July 6, is ‘Economic Recovery Through Innovation and Competitiveness’.

The ZITF management has invested K1.7 billion in the show and hopes to raise more than K2 billion from more than 75,000 showgoers.

The number of local exhibitors was this year expected to grow from 400 to 530 while foreign countries taking part were expected to rise from12 in 2009 to 16 this year.

First-time exhibitors at the show, which takes place every July, would include Botswana, Malawi and Namibia.

About 99 foreign-based companies were expected to exhibit at this year’s premier trade and business event.

Mr Musonda, however, expressed concern over the failure by the mining sector to participate in the trade fair despite enjoying better business prospects this year.

Press statement by Hon. Chifumu K. Banda, SC, MP on the launch of the publication of the Draft Constitution adopted by the National Constitutional Conference (NCC)

Members of the Press
Ladies and Gentlemen

May I take this rare opportunity to welcome you to this Press briefing, today, Tuesday, 22nd June, 2010.

I feel greatly honoured to launch the publication of the Initial Report of the Conference and the Draft Constitution that the Conference has adopted.

As some of you may be aware, section 23 of the National Constitutional Conference Act, No. 19 of 2007, as amended provides that the National Constitutional Conference should publish the Initial Report and the Draft Constitution adopted by the Conference and facilitate public debate and comments. The Conference is also mandated to receive memoranda from members of the public for incorporation, where appropriate, in the final Report and Draft Constitution.

The Conference has produced three documents, and these are:

(i) the Initial Report of the Conference
(ii) the Draft Constitution; and
(iii) the Summary of the Resolutions of the Conference.

In order to facilitate access by members of the general public, the documents will soon be available:

(i) through the office of the District Commissioner in each District;
(ii) the NCC Secretariat at Mulungushi International Conference Centre.
(iii) through three websites of:

(a) the Governance Secretariat under the Ministry of Justice whose website is: http://www.governance.gov.zm;
(b) the National Assembly whose website is: http://www.parliament.gov.zm; and
(c) the National Constitutional Conference whose website is: http://www.ncczambia.org

In addition, interest groups may directly get in touch with the Government Printers to buy copies.

I have to inform you ladies and gentlemen that, the Government Printer is still printing copies and these will be available as soon as possible.

Given that the Draft Constitution adopted by Conference has been published, the members of the public should take keen interest in reading the documents and provide useful comments to enhance the quality of our Constitution.

The governance of this nation will not improve by how much we quarrel among ourselves but how relevant and effective our institutions are; and this can only be done through the Constitution we give ourselves and the laws made there-under.

It is for this reason that members of the public should give their comments to the NCC Secretariat by:-

(i) e-mail on info@parliament.gov.zm, gs@governance.gov.zm and at secretariat@ncczambia.org ;
(ii) writing to the Secretariat;
(iii) participating in public discussions to be organized by the National Constitutional Conference;
(iv) facsmile on number 293077 Lusaka
(v) the “Have Your Say” window on the NCC website.

This activity will last for forty (40) days starting today, 22nd June, 2010 and end on Monday, 1st August, 2010.

It now remains my singular honour to launch the publication of the Initial Report and the Draft Constitution and commencement of receipt of public comments.

Thank you very much and May God Bless our Nation.

IT’s a done deal! Another economic block buster has been ‘bequeathed’ to Zambia. Soon, the sweet drops of Pepsi-Cola will start oozing and create 300 immediate jobs for Zambians.

In two months time, Zambia will have another beverage company added to the limited plants existing in the country. The Pepsi-Cola plant in Lusaka whose construction begun in September last year under the franchise of Varun Beverages a subsidiary RJ Corporation of India, is expected to open in the first week of August.

Varun Beverages-Zambia to be located in the vicinity of Zambia Breweries with a capital injection of US$20 million for the first phase, will give a number of management positions to Zambians. Apart from Pepsi and water-packaging, a range of fresh-fruit juices will also be processed.

The second phase will involve expansion into the Copperbelt in the next two years, at an estimated cost of US$15 million.

Varun Beverages chairperson Ravi Jaipuria has pledged commitment to ensuring good conditions of service for workers. A strong commitment to corporate-social responsibility and the environment has also been made.

Diplomats at the Zambia High Commission in New Delhi recently visited the headquarters of Varun Beverages on the outskirts of the capital, to acquaint themselves with operations of the company whose chain of other businesses include Pizza Hut, Costa Coffee and Kentucky Fried Chicken, popularly known as KFC, among others.

They learnt that 16 Zambians earmarked for technical positions are already in India under the auspices of the company, for orientation in beverage technology.

Mr Ravi Jaipuria extolled Zambia’s investment policies and stable political climate coupled with friendly people, as variables that attracted his company to invest in the country.

“Though landlocked, Zambia is a very peaceful country and because of its centrality it is easy to tap into the market in neighbouring countries. I will be a very good ambassador for Zambia by marketing the country to other investors.

“I met President Banda, then vice-president in 2008 here in New Delhi during the Africa-India Summit. He invited me to come and invest in Zambia and when I came to make a feasibility study, I fell in love with Zambia instantly,” said Mr Jaipuria recounting how he arrived at the decision to invest in Zambia.

Mr Jaipura noted that Zambia’s investment policies and the support from Government was also a motivating factor to inch into the southern African country.

Premised on the principle of partnering growth and creating opportunities, the pioneer bottlers in India with an inclination to health care, is determined to make a difference on the beverage scene in Zambia.

As part of preparing Zambians to take up technical jobs in the beverage industry, 16 people earmarked for technical positions are already in India under the auspices of the company, for orientation in beverage technology.

The company which will add to the core Pepsi-product, fruit juice processing, will also expand to the Copperbelt in the next two years. The expansion programme will gobble US$15million. Plans are also afoot to explore viability of the beverage industry in far flung and remotes parts of the country.

This will however, be dictated by the supply chain of raw materials and their availability. This is to ensure sustainable production.

The company will also consider diversifying into agriculture and dairy industry. When this happens, out-grower schemes will be an added. This will trigger farmer-motivation and increased productivity with one end result-more income for peasant farmers.

On corporate social responsibility front, the company with 18 bottling plants in India, is not disconnected from the need to plough back into the community.

Thus, contribution to the health and education sectors has been pledged as has, good environmental stewardship with particular attention to judicious treatment and disposal of effluent and participation in national efforts aimed at ameliorating the effects of environmental degradation.

Following the recent Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) and Export/Import Bank of India (Exim-Bank) conclave, the flood-gates of Indian investment into Zambia are poised to open even wider.

At this event, where the country’s investment opportunities were projected into Indian view, a mosaic of Zambian business executives and representatives from the Zambia Development Agency (ZDA) networked with the Indian business community under the theme India-Africa Project Partnership.

The conclave also provided a platform for African entrepreneurs to network with their Indian counterparts and explore business partnerships in addition to providing hints on how to access financing for small–to-medium enterprises, (SMEs).

The Zambian booth with depictions of various areas of investment also made video presentations of Zambia’s thrilling tourist-attractions to sale the country as a tourism destination.

The booth pulled atleast 60 Indian business executives, who were enthused by the oasis of investment opportunities available in Zambia in areas such as energy, manufacturing, infrastructure development and tourism, among others.

From that, the pulse is palpable that, Indian investments into Zambia will continue to flow steadily.

The investments will attest even more, to the warm relations that bind Zambia and India and fulfill the quest for the Indian sub-continent, to set up value-addition enterprises, as opposed to mere trading.

The author is first secretary for Press at the Zambia High Commission
in New Delhi, India.

Source: Zambia Daily Mail

THE continuous mobile voter registration exercise took off on a slow note yesterday with some centres registering low levels of potential voters by press time.

In some areas, the programme completely failed to take off because of confusion arising from demands to be paid allowances.

A survey carried out in some centres in Solwezi, Kitwe, Lusaka, Ndola and reports from the Zambia News and Information Services revealed that the registration of voters started late instead of the scheduled 08:00 hours.

In Lusaka, some registration centres opened after 14:00 hours as opposed to the scheduled 08:00 hours.
A check at Northmead Basic School in Lusaka Central constituency found only two people had registered by 15:00 hours.

The officer manning the centre said some people were turned away because they did not have supporting documents.

At NIPA College in Lusaka Central constituency, a few people were found registering but the registration equipment developed a fault, as it failed to print out information for the voter’s card.

At Lotus Basic School, Kamwala High School and Lusaka City Council hall in Kabwata constituency, no people were found registering.

A check at Chaisa community hall in Mandevu constituency showed that registration officers were deployed to the area after 14:00 hours.

At the Ndola Trust School, a lone registration officer and a police officer were found setting up equipment to start the process. Ndola town clerk Charity Mphande said in an interview yesterday that the officers were deployment late in the morning.

“Not everyone started the exercise at 08:00 hours because we had to pay them their lunch allowances, so basically the exercise started slightly late,” Mrs. Mphande said.

She urged all eligible Ndola residents to register as voters because the Electoral Commission of Zambia (ECZ) and Government have spent a lot of money on the exercise.

“It is important that those of us who don’t have voters’ cards go and register as voters because Government and the ECZ have gone to great lengths to start this process…it is not cheap,” Mrs. Mphande said.

She said all those who will be turning 18 by July, 2010 are eligible to register as voters and should not wait until they attain the age.

Mrs Mphande said there will be no extension of the voter registration exercise and that people should take advantage of the ongoing exercise to register as voters.

In Kitwe, some registration centres did not open to members of the public who wanted to register as voters.

A check in some selected centres found people waiting for election officers.

A large crowd was found at Kitwe City Council main library in Nkana constituency and Bulangililo Basic School in Kwacha constituency where people wanted to register as voters.

Some teachers at Bulangililo Basic School said election officers went to the school in the morning but could not attend to the people because they did not have the materials.

Copperbelt provincial local government officer Solomon Sakala confirmed that some centres did not open yesterday.

“Some centres did not open yesterday, people should not lose hope, and they will be captured in due course. The election officers are supposed to be at a particular centre for about 12 days and then move to other centres,” Mr Sakala said.

Kalulushi town clerk Maxwell Kabanda said the exercise started on a slow note because some equipment failed in the morning.

He said the information technology officer started working on the equipment later in the day.
Elsewhere, the exercise failed to take off in the three constituencies of Solwezi because of logistical problems.

The Road Development Agency (RDA) says most of the works on the roads have not been completed because of inadequate resource allocation to the agency. RDA Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Erasmus Chilundika said this when he appeared before the Parliamentary Accounts Committee (PAC) today.
Mr. Chilundika told the committee that the agency faces problems with funding saying the allocation towards the construction of roads and bridges in the country required more money which he said has hinderedthe agency from completing the works on most roads.

He said even the National Roads Fund Agency (NRFA) most of the times failed to fund the construction of roads if the money required was huge. He said some roads and bridges that were not in the RDA work plan were worked on due to the public outcry and called for supplementary funding. He however said thatthe agency would ensure that roads that have remained uncompleted for sometime were worked on before the end of next year.

He disclosed that the Choma-Namwala road will be completed by the end of this year while the Kasama- Luwingu road would be worked on as well. During the same sitting, Works and Supply Permanent Secretary Watson Ng’ambi said his ministry is committed to ensuring thatthe agency worked on all the roads in the country where contractors abandoned work before finishing.

He said contractors who have failed to do quality work on the roads would be reported to the NCC to ensure that they are disciplined and that money paid to them would be recovered.

Earlier, Nkana Member of Parliament Mwenya Musenge who is the member of PAC said RDA only carried out road rehabilitation and construction where there was a by election leaving major roads such as the Kasama-Luwingu road which had remained uncompleted for over 10 years.

Mr. Musenge said the agency was not prudent in utilising public resources allocated to them saying it was untrue that the agency had no funds to work on the roads.

But PAC Chairperson Emmanuel Hachipuka urged Mr. Musenge and the committee to leave the by elections out of the deliberations. The chairperson also urged RDA to cooperate with the officers from the Auditor General whenever they visited them to verify reports and said they should ensure that all irregularities were corrected to avoid appearing several times before the PAC.

Meanwhile, the Permanent Secretary said his offices will always be open to receive the officers from the Auditor General adding that they would ensure that measures were taken to correct the errors.

FLAME Arab Contractors has been officially launched in Zambia with Government hoping that the firm can reduce the price of constructing a kilometre of a road from US$1 million to US$350,000.

Minister of Commerce, Trade and Industry Felix Mutati said the Egyptian company is able to deliver six kilometres of road per day compared to the available contractors who work on an average 100 kilometres per week.

He said the cost of constructing a kilometre of road in Egypt is about US$150,000 compared to US$ 1 million on average per kilometre in Zambia.

Mr Mutati also expressed worry at contractors who are not charging competitive prices in the industry saying they are slowing down infrastructure development.

He said local contractors are not delivering competitive prices in the construction sector hence Government’s decision to allow more foreign investment in the sector.

He was speaking at the official launch of Flame Arab Contractors, an Egyptian firm, in Lusaka on Wednesday night.

Mr Mutati said most roads have taken so long to be constructed and cited the Mutanda-Chavuma road as one of them.

He said many people are fed up with contractors who are not able to deliver. He said most contractors were just good at billing penalties, variations and standing time.

Mr Mutati said the investment by Flame Arab Contractors will add on to the US$50 million investment that has been accumulated from Egypt in the last two years.

He said the investment has created over 2,000 jobs.
Mr Mutati commended the company for showing generosity by offering to train 20 Zambian engineers and to provide them air tickets.

And Flame Arab Contractors intends to invest US$10 million in the construction industry in Zambia this year.

The company will begin with an initial capital of US$10 million as a start-up and will raise the investment capital as it grows.

Company chairman Mohammad Salama said the firm will bring the cost of construction down to facilitate more development using the same resources at hand.

Mr Salama said his firm sees opportunities in projects like the North-South Corridor, the expansion of local airports and the development of railways.

He also urged Government to use the Public Private Partnership Act to create more opportunities for the private sector.

He said his company has also been selected by the Ministry of Education to build Malukupwika Teachers’ Training College in Chinsali consisting of 26 buildings.

The company has been in Zambia for four years now and has since constructed Finsbury Park, Radisson Blue Hotel, Coliseum and Diamonds of Lusaka.