Maravi

Kunda is behaving like a rabid dog – Sata

Kunda is behaving like a rabid dog – Sata
By Patson Chilemba
Wed 23 Dec. 2009, 04:01 CAT

PATRIOTIC Front (PF) president Michael Sata yesterday said Vice-President George Kunda is behaving like a rabid dog because he has run out of ideas on how to defend DPP Chalwe Mchenga's criminality.

And Transparency International Zambia (TIZ) president Reuben Lifuka asked Vice-President Kunda to respond to arguments on demands for the DPP to resign rather than embarking on wholesale attacks on individuals and organisations.

The sources said the technocrats, in consultation with other stakeholders, made some changes to the proposed bill, which excluded some punitive measures but when the same bill was showed to Vice-President Kunda last week, he was very upset that the punitive measures were removed.

The sources said Vice-President Kunda ordered the technocrats to prepare another bill which was to include all the punitive measures, within 48 hours.

“A team of technocrats went into a retreat somewhere the whole of last weekend to prepare a bill that is acceptable to the Vice-President,” the source said. “This bill is now ready for presentation to the Vice-President.”

The source said the media bill was a hybrid of the media laws from Zimbabwe, Uganda and Kenya.

According to the bill, among other things, it seeks to establish the Media Council of Zambia as well as the Zambia Institute of Journalists. It will provide for the regulation of the media by the Media Council of Zambia whose members will be appointed by the Minister of Information and Broadcasting Services. The bill will also provide for the licensing of journalists.

The source said one of the punitive measures in the bill is that any journalist contravening this media law would be liable for imprisonment up to three years.

“In this bill, they have also defined who a journalist is,” the source said.
The sources revealed that technocrats in the Ministry of Justice were not happy with the way Vice-President Kunda was pushing this matter without allowing input from stakeholders.

“One can safely say this is a George Kunda law because even State House doesn’t seem to have any contribution. The Vice-President appear to be pushing this line alone because we hear that even Dickson Jere supports self-regulation of the media and not statutory regulation. Many times you hear Honourable Shikapwasha information minister making noise on this matter. But he doesn’t speak his mind, those are the instructions from the Vice-President,” the sources said.

“We all know that Vice-President Kunda will take advantage of the President’s long absence to push his agenda so that by the time the President is coming back from his annual holiday in Mfuwe, everything will have been done. The President will be breaking off for Christmas and New Year. This is the time the Vice-President intends to push his agenda on media regulation. The unfortunate thing is that the parent ministry, the Ministry of Information doesn’t seem to have any meaningful contribution in this matter as the Vice-President is busy driving the process.”

Labels: GEORGE KUNDA, REUBEN LIFUKA, SATA, TIZ

posted by MrK @ 4:26 AM