Appoint female press aide, presidential candidates told

TWO media bodies in the country have urged political parties in the forth-coming presidential election to consider appointing a female press aide once elected into office.
Zambia has never had a woman press aide since independence.
Speaking in an interview with Femail, Zambia Union of Journalists General Secretary Angela Chishimba said it is high time elected governments appointed female press aides as a way of empowering women in the media.
Ms Chishimba said there are capable women in the media who can represent the President both at local and international levels.
She said, “Just the same way they have appointed women in sectors, such as in the police, auditor general and anti-corruption commission, they should also empower women in the media.
Press Association of Zambia executive secretary Patson Phiri has challenged women in the media to engage in political reporting if they are to be recognised by political parties.
“But now gender empowerment has become one of the qualities of good governance, it is important that politicians look at that principle and implement it at all cost,” Mr Phiri said.
And Media Institute of Southern Africa chairperson Hellen Mwale said the appointment of a female press aide will be a great gift to the media frantenity.
She noted that SADC protocol requires to have 50 per cent of women in decision making positions.
"Fifty years after independence Zambia has only had one female spokesperson at statehouse during the reign of Dr Kenneth Kaunda by the name of Dr Mable Milimoell," Ms Mwale said.

Construction sites get 72,000 condoms monthly

OVER 72,000 condoms are distributed to each road construction site every month to meet the high demand though they remain in short supply at the source.



According to Youth Cultural Promotion Association executive director Beck Banda, the demand for condoms is high in areas where road construction works are taking place.



However, Dr Banda said the supply for condoms is low and they are not readily available even in areas such as Lusaka.



Speaking in an interview, Dr Banda who is also engaged by the Road Development Agency in sensitising road construction workers on HIV/AIDS said over 72,000 condoms are given out at sites every month.



He said “we have done so much sensitising in districts where road construction works are taking place because girls and women are indulging in sexual activities due to poverty. So we sensitise both construction workers and the community.’


Dr Banda added that sensitisation programmes will be extended to schools in the construction sites this year.


“A warning to parents with children in boarding schools located where road construction works are taking place: make sure you give adequate food stuffs to your children to avoid them going to construction workers who will give them what they need in exchange for sex,” he said.



Meanwhile Dr Banda has called on government through RDA to increase funding to the HIV/AIDS sensitisation programmes due to the huge task involved.



He said there are many communities to reach countrywide which need these services.



And Dr Banda has since commended construction firms for allowing their workers to be sensitised on good behavioural practices.


“We have worked with China-Henain, China Civil, China-state, Road and pave and China Jauxi. And we hope they continue rendering their support even the New Year,” he added.



Government through RDA in 2012 embarked on a programme meant to sensitise road construction workers on their sites and neighbouring communities on  HIV/AIDS and gender activities.



This came in wake of reports that girls and women were offering sex in exchange for money due to poverty and in turn increasing the levels of HIV/AIDS in the country.

Traditional leaders join fight against malnutrition

ZAMBIA is one of the countries in Africa with the highest burden of under nutrition in children.
Thousands of children suffer from one or more forms of malnutrition including low birth weight, wasting, stunting and underweight.
The current child stunting levels in Zambia stand at 45 percent with a breakdown of prevalence of wasting at five percent, prevalence of underweight at 15 percent and stunting is at 15 percent.
Rural areas are the worst hit with under nutrition in Zambia with Mumbwa in Central Province almost covering half of the national stunting statistics.
However, the first 1,000 most critical days programme (exclusive breastfeeding) is one of the key interventions Government has put in place to ensure child stunting is reduced.
Subsequently, the burden to reduce malnutrition has attracted fierce participation from key stakeholders such as traditional rulers, who are aiming at reducing it in their chiefdoms.
Chief Mwansakombe of Samfya in Luapula Province said he has resolved to engage in the fight against malnutrition due to the high number of children dying in his chiefdom.
The traditional leader spoke under the auspices of the Civil Society Organisation Scaling-up Nutrition alliance (CSO-SUN) at the national nutrition forum held recently.
He said 300 children die from malnutrition every year in his chiefdom and added that it is a huge number to lose in a year.
Suffice to say, Chief Mwansakombe has embarked on vigorous campaigns to end malnutrition in his area. Among the initiatives he has embarked on include sensitising women on good breastfeeding practices.
Exclusive breastfeeding of children is essential in the fight against underweight and medical experts advise that children are supposed to be breastfed for a period of six months.
Additionally, the traditional ruler urges that children are not supposed to be restricted to one variety of food.
“When you go to a Zambian home and they serve you lunch, it’s obvious you know the kind of meal you will be served. So it’s important we change the kind of food we serve in our homes,” he said.
Underweight, which mostly results in child stunting, adversely affects the cognitive development of a child.
It affects their educational abilities and outcomes, their health and future life prospects.
And the economic cost of under nutrition to Zambia over the last 10-year period has been estimated to be as high as US$775 million productivity.
Further, Chief Mwansakombe has since called on the national food and nutrition commission to decentralise their nutrition messages from district to village level.
Going east, Chief Madzimawe of the Ngoni people of Chipata said stringent measures have been take to ensure that underweight and malnutrition are reduced in the province.
In an interview, Chief Madzimawe said the royal establishment has done away with the brewing and drinking of ‘kachasu’ (a local beer), which makes parents irresponsible at the expense of providing food for their children.
He said: “We have a project like ‘mawa’ that promotes the growing of orange maize and orange sweet potatoes among farmers, which are nutritious and cardinal to the growth of children.”
“And we encourage our farmers to grow variety of crops. We are also putting up sheds where excess crops are stored so that we give out to vulnerable and poor families round our chiefdoms,” Chief Madzimawe added.
Meanwhile, Chief Macha of Southern Province also added that he is currently building a community hall, where the local people will gather for cooking demonstrations by nutrition experts.
He said it was important for people to be subjected to cooking demonstrations so that they have knowledge on how to prepare various nutritious local foods.
“I am appealing to Government to send nutrition experts to my chiefdom so that they train my people, who will in turn train the rest of the villagers on important cooking lessons that can improve the nutrition of our children and further reduce child stunting and underweight here,” the traditional ruler said.
According to the traditional leaders, recommendations must be made to improve current plans and accelerate progress towards a Zambia where all children will be afforded adequate nutrition and a full life potential, regardless of where they are born or live.
The responsibility, therefore, falls on all stakeholders to capitalise on this crucial momentum and urgently seize upon the opportunity before it is lost.
CSO-SUN Alliance National co-ordinator William Chilufya noted that investment must be made towards infant and young children nutrition. Every year, one million lives are saved, 369 million more children and their mothers have healthier lives and there is an increase in the country’s GDP by two-three percent.
“Investments in the nutrition are the best foundation for a strong, prosperous future for the nation,” he said.

Decentralise child birth registration

GOVERNMENT must decentralise the registration and issuance of certificates if the number of child registration is to increase, World Vision national child rights advocacy co-ordinator Lifuna Simushi has said.

And World Vision Zambia has this year done 14,000 birth registrations although certificates are yet to be issued.

In an interview with Femail, Mr Simushi said the current situation where all issuance of birth certificates are done in Lusaka has drastically contributed to low levels of registration which is at 15 per cent countrywide.

He also expressed concern over the failure by Government to highlight the benefits of registering births among ordinary communities in the country.

“Communities still do not see the value of having births registered. In other countries you cannot get a place in Grade one or university without a birth certificate; in Zambia we have plenty of alternatives like using an affidavit,” Mr Simushi said.

Additionally he said Government should attach priority to registering births because it is important in the fight against child marriages and cases of defilement and sexual abuse.

“We have had situations where it is difficult to prove that the child who is defiled or married off is a minor in the absence of a birth record,” Mr Simushi said. The birth certificate legitimises the existence and identity and gives a child a sense of belonging.

And World Vision child protection advocacy officer Chikontwe Mulenga said the institution has managed to withdraw 150 girls from child marriages.

Mr Mulenga said the involvement of traditional rulers has made an impact on the fight against child marriages.

He also said child advocacy protection clubs have been created in schools to promote child participation in the issues that affect them.

Media has demonised men – Mannasseh

 THE media has created a picture that Zambian men are the cause of all the evil that happens to women, Lusaka-based HIV/AIDS activist Mannasseh Phiri has said.

Dr Phiri said the media has continued creating an image that men are bad hence perpetuating stereotypes.

Speaking during a plenary discussion at the first-ever national forum for Gender in Media organised by Alchemy Women in Leadership, he said the media does not highlight the good other men do.

“The media has created a picture that men are cheats, liars, womanisers, defilers, HIV transmitters, and the list is endless, but we still have good men out there who are worth of profiling in the media,” Dr Phiri said.

He said there is need for transformative journalism that will endeavour to see that professional ethics are respected.

Dr Phiri challenged the media to build boys instead of attempting to repair men who are already grown. “Let’s build boys to men of quality who are not afraid to be equal to women,” he added.

And Zambia National Broadcasting Corporation director of programmes Kenneth Maduma said there is a challenge of unprofessionalism in the media hence the growing tendency of portraying men as evil.

Mr Maduma said media personnel sensationalise stories in order to sell their stories.
“We are leaving a lot of stories hanging because we do not investigate thoroughly and that in itself has led to men being deemed bad before the eyes of society,” he said.

Is labia elongation a violation of women’s bodies

OFTEN times, I stare at my body in the mirror whether conscious or not, I realise that African black women have little or no control over what happens to their bodies with special regards towards sexual gratification.
Vivid memories of my early teen days serve me of times when an elderly woman opposite our house in Lusaka’s Libala township, where I grew up from, would coerce me to engage in labia-pulling without giving reasons why such a strenuous activity was important.
I remember how I would sit in the bathroom in the evenings practicing it as it is supposed to be done behind closed doors.
I would do it manually and at the end of it all, I would but just experience excruciating pain and sometimes I was advised to take certain herbs that would make them grow faster without any pain.
During class, my fellow schoolgirls would say “the labia are used to enhance sexual satisfaction for a man and sometimes makes childbirth easier.”
My teachers would tell me that “women who do not pull their labia to a desirable size will never get married and if they do, men will run away from them in search of women who have.”
Labia stretching also referred to as labia-elongation or labia-pulling is the act of elongating the labia minora through manual manipulation.
It is commonly referred to as ‘bush visiting’ because girls often perform it while in the bush on errands such as collecting firewood.
They begin the practice at 9 to 12 years because at this age, the young girl’s tissues are softer and flexible for pulling.
It is a familiar cultural practice in most African countries such as Rwanda, Zambia, Malawi, Uganda, Burundi and a few other countries in sub-Saharan Africa.
It is performed for sexual enhancement of a man and is perceived to facilitate orgasm and female ejaculation.
However the benefits labia elongation may have, truth remains it adds no ‘flavour’ to the sexual romance between a man and woman.
And to solidify that labia elongation adds no ‘aroma’ to the sexual act, Lusaka-based reproductive health specialist Swebby Macha said there is no evidence medically to suggest that the elongation enhances sexual pleasure in both men and women.
Dr Macha, however, said most of the perceived enhanced sexual pleasure could be psychological.
He noted that there are minor health risks involved in labia pulling such as initial pain, swelling and irritation from certain herbal oils.
“During sexual stimulation, the labia minora swell and become more sensitive to stimulation,” Dr Macha added.
Apart from health risks involved, labia elongation does infringe on the sexual rights of women.
To Peter Mweemba, a married man of Lusaka, labia-elongation is an act of slavery where a woman is made to be an object of sexual satisfaction of a man.
Mr Mweemba said the sexual rights of a woman are violated as she is made to do everything possible to ensure a man is satisfied in bed.
“To me, whether a woman has them or not doesn’t serve any purpose but I would rather go for one with the natural ones,” he narrated.
So true is that labia pulling is solely for the benefit of a man and obviously leaves a woman with no choice to choose what she feels is best for her.
Similarly, Young Women Christian Association (YWCA) an organisation that supports the sexual and reproductive rights of women told this author that the culture of labia elongation should not be mandatory for all girls to practice.
YWCA executive director Patricia Ndhlovu charged that the culture of labia-elongation should not be imposed on the young girls but rather they must be given freedom to choose what they feel is best for themselves.
Ms Ndhlovu challenged traditional counsellors tasked with the responsibility of handling young girls once matured to give proper guidance to them regarding the importance of labia elongation.
“Personally, I do not think labia pulling has any bearing on sexual intercourse and we demand that girls should be furnished with information as regards to why they must be engaged in labia pulling,” she added.
And as we commemorate this year’s 16 Days of Activism against gender-based violence, it is particularly important that certain cultural practices are abolished or rather amended to ensure that the rights of women are not violated.
This year’s 16 days of activism against gender-based violence is running under the theme ‘From peace in the home to peace in the nation: Stop gender-based violence: Empower women’.
Violence against women range from physical, emotional, sexual, and verbal and the list goes on.
And part six Article 21 of the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC) protocol on gender and development, member states are urged to eliminate gender-based violence such as domestic violence, rape, femicide, sexual harassment, female genital mutilation and all other forms of GBV.
Furthermore, the article states that member states should discourage traditional norms including social, economic, cultural and political practices, which legitimise and exacerbate the persistence and tolerance of GBV with the view to eliminate them.

Africa should continue wooing investors’

AFRICA should create a good environment for investors to foster public private partnerships for advanced sustainable economic growth on the continent.
This was said at the three-day second African Union private sector and agribusiness forum that was here recently.
The forum ran under the theme ‘transforming Africa’s agriculture for shared prosperity and improved livelihoods: harnessing opportunities for inclusive growth and sustainable development’.
In her keynote address, Commissioner for Rural Economy and Agriculture for African Union Commission Rhoda Tumusiime noted that there is an increase in the number of private sector firms that seek to partner with African governments in fostering change in the agriculture sector.
Ms Tumusiime said there is need to scale up and replicate these efforts in a sustainable and all-inclusive manner.
She said “as the AUC we will continue to pursue mutually beneficial long-term relationships that we see building between the private sector and our governments that will be based on mutual understanding of incentives, roles and expectations of the public and private sectors.”
Ms Tumusiime also earlier noted that member states should take agriculture as a business that has to be financed.
She said unless the sector is funded to play its role, it will not be able to contribute the much-needed rewards and other multiplier effects on improved food, nutrition, jobs, wealth and social welfare.
Meanwhile, Rwandan Minister of Agriculture and Animal Resources Geraldine Mukeshimana said agribusiness remains important in that it contributes to poverty reduction.
Ms Mukeshimana said agribusiness contributes three percent to Africa’s gross domestic product.
She said African governments should take advantage of the increasing population as this will increase demand for food.
“Unfortunately we are seeing a situation where there is reduced investment in agriculture worldwide which has resulted in food shortage and poverty,” Ms Mukeshimana said.