Zambia: Media players shelve ZAMEC launch

The Media Liaison Committee (MLC) has suspended the launch of the Zambia Media Council (ZAMEC) from May 3, 2010 to a date to be announced after the World Press Freedom Day commemorations.

MLC spokesperson Amos Chanda said in a statement in Lusaka yesterday that the suspension was necessary to give the Government an opportunity to reflect on the decisions taken at the national media conference held at Pamodzi Hotel last week.

Mr Chanda said the media decided to suspend the launch during the meeting it had yesterday in Lusaka.

“Our decision comes in the light of Government’s concerns on the Fringilla Consensus report and therefore we have allowed them time to consider the key amendments that were effected to the report at the Pamodzi meeting,” Mr Chanda said.

However, Mr Chanda said the position would be subjected to approval by the second stakeholders’ conference on May 2, which mandated the MLC to deal with the matter following Information and Broadcasting Services Minister Ronnie Shikapwasha’s new position.

He said regrettable as it was that the minister decided to base the Government position on a new draft document, the media was still open for discussions towards the perfection of the self-regulatory mechanism.

Mr Chanda said the window that the MLC had opened was only as far as discussing self-regulation and not any form of statutory regulation as suggested by Lieutenant-General Shikapwasha.

He said the Kenyan Media Act, which the Government favoured, had raised controversy such that both the Government and media considered it an experience yet to show any tangible signs of success.

Mr Chanda said the majority of media professionals and civil society regarded the Act as one of the lowest points of the Kenyan democratic enterprise since the country’s return to plural politics in the 1990s.

- April 28, 2010 by The Times of Zambia

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Source: www.times.co.zm/news/viewnews.cgi (accessed on 29.04.2010)