On August 27 2004, the Lusaka High Court dismissed an application by the state arguing that six media organizations that sued the state had wrongly commenced the matter of challenging the legality of government's decision not to take all the recommended names appointed to sit on the Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA) and the Zambia National Broadcasting Services (ZNBC) boards to parliament for ratification. In his ruling in chambers, High Court Judge Gregory Phiri said the matter was properly commenced before the court and could therefore be heard by judicial review.

Candidates running for the presidency in Zambia will have to hold a high school diploma, a government-appointed committee has recommended in a report into proposed changes to electoral law. The report also suggests that a candidate must collect more than 50% of the vote to win the presidency to avoid minority leaders. President Levy Mwanawasa has said that new electoral regulations will be passed early in 2005 to pave the way to the 2006 elections. The proposed requirements for a minimum academic attainment could keep Michael Sata, leader of the opposition, out of the presidential race.

Corruption charges against the former intelligence chief Xavier Chungu and Attan Shansonga, the former Zambian ambassador to the United States, were dismissed last week when it was ruled that they were beyond the jurisdiction of Zambian courts after they jumped bail and fled abroad. Chungu faces more than 100 charges of corruption and theft of public funds but his current whereabouts are unknown. Shansonga is in Britain where he is a citizen through marriage.

The Zambian government's crusade against corruption has suffered a major setback with the collapse of a court case against two key suspects, former intelligence chief Xavier Chungu and his co-accused Attan Shansonga, the former Zambian ambassador to the United States. Charges against Chungu and Shansonga were dismissed last week when it was ruled that they were beyond the jurisdiction of Zambian courts after they jumped bail and fled abroad.

Katele Kalumba, Zambia's former foreign minister, and three ex-senior Treasury officials, have been arrested and charged with corruption. The charges relate to contracts awarded to two US firms, through which the government lost in excess of $20 million. Their trial is scheduled to begin on 10th September.

Strike action is imminent at the University of Zambia after lecturers vowed not to teach next week until Vice-Chancellor Professor Robert Serpell and his deputy are removed. But UNZA Vice-Chancellor, Professor Robert Serpell has maintained that the University would run as scheduled and expects all members of staff to begin normal duties next week when classes were expected to resume.

Shortages of a critical generic antiretroviral (ARV) drug used in Zambia's treatment programme have revealed a lack of adequate planning by the government that could derail the ARV rollout, activists told IRIN last Thursday. Zambian health minister Dr Brian Chituwo announced in parliament this week that supplies of Triomune-30, a fixed-dose combination of Nevirapine, Lamivudine and Stavudine, had run out.

Corruption in Zambia has reached levels that cannot be ignored, the Speaker of the National Assembly, Amusaa Mwanamwambwa, has observed. Speaking at the opening of a parliamentary anti-corruption workshop the Speaker said that recent studies showed that levels of corruption had worsened and that "apart from inhibiting investment, corruption creates an intolerable environment for ordinary citizens, who have to pay bribes to access social and health facilities, official documentation and justice, to which they are entitled."

The launching of the Social Watch report 2004 in Zambia sparked a nation-wide discussion on poverty in the country. Finance Minister Ngandu Magande argued there is now plenty of food in the country and questioned the accuracy of the Social Watch indicators. In an editorial comment, the influential Zambian daily "The Post" advised the minister "to look at his own government's statistics on poverty produced by the Central Statistical Office" and argued that "the issues raised in the 2004 Social Watch report are true and deserve our government's and indeed all our politicians' most serious considerations".

Zambia's minister of health, Brian Chituwo, recently boasted that 6,000 out of a targeted 10,000 people living with AIDS, have accessed the government's cheap anti-retroviral (ARV) drugs since a roll-out began last August. What he does not mention is that even though women make up the majority of people living with AIDS in this southern African country, they constitute less than 10%of those accessing ARV drugs.

The World Food Programme has announced that it fed almost 830,000 Zambians last month. This comes despite the fact that Zambia had a successful harvest and is expected to export an estimated 120,000mt of maize. The western region of the country is at particular risk as a result of the crops lost by farmers when the Zambezi River flooded at the beginning of the year

The Zambian Government has announced that it is reviewing the Anti-Corruption Act to introduce stiffer penalties and catch private sector offenders. Speaking to reporters, President Mwanawasa also revealed that the Government was in the process of formulating a comprehensive corruption-prevention strategy and he urged other SADC countries to support the proposed protocol against corruption.

Thousands of Angolan refugees returning home from Zambia face food shortages and get only half rations, a United Nations official said Wednesday. The World Food Programme, which has been feeding refugees in camps and handing out supplies to those returning home, said rations were small especially on the Angolan side, WFP spokesman Mike Huggins told AFP. "Resources for this exercise are extremely tight, especially on the Angolan side where rations have had to be reduced by up to 50 percent," said Huggins.

In an effort to ease tensions between the government and civil society, Zambia's President Levy Mwanawasa this week exempted an influential coalition of civic and religious groups from having to register. Last month the Forum, an umbrella group comprising the Law Association of Zambia, the Roman Catholic Church and several women's organisation, among others, refused to register with the registrar of societies, arguing that by law "loose alliances" were not required to register and, since its member organisations were all registered, there was no need for it to enlist as a separate entity.

The Media Council of Zambia (MECOZ), a self-regulatory media council, was officially launched at a press briefing held at the Pamodzi Hotel in Lusaka, according to the Media Institute of Southern Africa (Misa). MECOZ, which is the brainchild of the Misa's Zambia Chapter and the Press Association of Zambia (PAZA), has taken almost four years to be established.

Headlines like 'Three hundred Zambians displaced, over 10 families left homeless and 40 families seeking shelter' are a regular feature in the Zambian media. Countless people have over the years been left out in the cold without a place to call their home -- sometimes due to natural disasters while at other times by authorities that exercise their rights, especially in cases where there have been malpractices in the allocation of land. Such type of people end up relocating to other places in search of a "resting place". And they are commonly referred to as Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs).

Operations at the Zambian Ministry of Finance were grounded this week when unionised workers staged a sit-in to demand payment of negotiated housing allowances by government. The Finance Minister, Ng'anda Maganda, declared the action illegal and said that workers had refused to be paid the revised housing allowances because they were still considering legal action.

Zambia has the "potential" to meet five of its eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by 2015, according to a new UN progress report. The country can provide all its children with access to primary education; potentially halt the spread of HIV/AIDS and malaria; reduce child mortality; and provide more of its population with safe drinking water and basic sanitation. However, the 2003 MDG annual report said Zambia was unlikely to meet three of its goals: halve hunger as well as poverty, and reduce the maternal mortality ratio by three-quarters.

About 5 000 Rwandan refugees in Zambia have refused to go home under a United Nations repatriation scheme saying their lives were still in danger, a United Nations official said. A senior Zambian government official said that Lusaka was planning to revoke the refugee status of Rwandans who refused to go home.

The Commonwealth Secretariat has written to the former President of Zambia, Frederick Chiluba, informing him that his request for foreign observers to monitor his trial has been turned down as it does not have such a mandate. Chiluba, who is standing trial for a raft of corruption charges, including the theft of $41 million from the state during his presidency, has also requested observers from SADC and the AU but neither have yet replied.