The Mindolo Ecumenical Foundation (MEF) has changed its duration of Media and Communications diploma course from nine months to two years. This is in a bid to meet Technical Education, Vocational and Entrepreneurship Training (TEVETA) regulations. The media and communications (Journalism) programme has been running for nine months over the past seven years as a department under MEF.

Mindolo Ecumenical Foundation (MEF) director, Rev Reuben Daka, has revealed that the clinic will this year experience fewer drug shortages, compared to last year. Rev Daka said this on Friday 22nd January, during a two-hour orientation talk with first year students. The MEF has signed an agreement with the Churches Health Association of Zambia (CHAZ) to assist the clinic with medical supplies.

Mary Sikaneta pre-school has received four student teachers from Oslo University in Norway. The students, who are studying early-childhood training, are on a three month internship. Their names are Hane, Vebeke, Turio and Camilla. ''We are excited to learn teaching methods, social behaviour and Zambian culture," said one of the interns. The affiliation agreement allows students to have great Zambian experiences. The programme would be of great benefit to Zambian teachers at the pre-school if they could go to Norway as well.

“It is very frustrating to be in Zambia and remain a Zambian at a time such as this when corruption seems to be here to stay.” Heritage Party leader Brigadier General Godfrey Miyanda made this statement as he urged President Rupiah Banda and his cabinet to reject Vice-President George Kunda’s recommendation to pay about K5 billion to ministers and other Lusaka-based parliamentarians attending the National Constitution Conference (NCC).

The director of the newly-established prison medical directorate in Zambia, Deputy Prison Commissioner, Dr Chisela Chileshe, has urged the prison command in Zambia to start providing condoms to inmates in Zambian prisons to avert the escalating prevalence of HIV infections. The HIV prevalence rate amongst inmates in Zambian prisons is almost twice that of the outside community.

A Cabinet Committee of Ministers on HIV and AIDS has made a declaration of commitment to increase internal funding to HIV and AIDS programmes in Zambia. In a communiqué issued in Lusaka recently, the Cabinet Committee of Zambian Ministers on HIV and AIDS stressed that the Zambian Government has realized the need for home grown solutions to the threat of the epidemic on the productive lives of its citizenry.

The Ministry of Health has banned all microbicide clinical trials in Zambia. This is according to a letter dated December 29, 2009, addressed to a Dr J. Stringer -- an official at the Centre for Disease Research, written and signed by health permanent secretary, Dr Velepi Mtonga. 
Dr Mtonga stated that the ministry would not approve any clinical trials until such a time that safer and more efficacious methods were available.

If Africans saw themselves, or at least saw how they would like to be, in Nelson Mandela, the Jacob Zuma reflects who we really are. To accuse him is to lay blame on ourselves. Zuma is a mirror that reflects what we would be in his position. After all, has he not been invited to attend Nc’ wala ceremony in Zambia later this year? If he were not a reflection of us, what would he be coming to do at Nc’ wala ceremony?

A Copperbelt University student has committed suicide in Kitwe’s Riverside Extension. A CBU student hanged himself on Tuesday 26th January at his parents home after the Zambia National Football Team went down 4 -5 in a post-match penalty shoot-out with the Super Eagles of Nigeria. The student was complaining about why Zambia’s defender failed to convert the penalty that lost them the game.

ZAMBIA has become one of the seven countries worldwide, most seriously affected countries by HIV. This is according to the recently released Zambia Demographic and Health Survey statistics. According to the final report released by the Zambia National HIV/AIDS/STI/TB Council, almost 1.6 percent of the adult population becomes newly infected each year.

The former Prime Minister of Britain, Neville Chamberlain, stated in 1937, “For any government deliberately to deny to their people what must be their plainest and simplest right (to live in peace and happiness without the nightmare of war) would be to betray their trust and call down upon their heads the condemnation of all mankind.” He further stated, “I do not believe that such a government anywhere exists among civilized peoples..."

The debate of 50%+1 currently before National Constitutional Conference (NCC) is one of the most regretful moments of this constitution making process. For my own part, I consider it as nothing less than a question of whether this nation shall have a constitution that begins with “We the people” or “We the government in power.” The magnitude of this subject demands that the commissioners quickly go back to the people they are representing

The 29th December 2009 marked 18 years of Zambia as Christian Nation. Unless the church is mobilised to appreciate that the declaration is meant to inspire and motivate Christians and to align them with God's mission to change their communities, the general populace will question the relevance and the credibility of the declaration. The President Rupiah Banda has challenged the church to unveil and explain clearly what

It is a practice that has rarely been written or talked about, but female genital elongation is real. It has been practiced in most parts of central Africa. Mrs Elizabeth Zulu is an “alangizi” -- a traditional marriage counselor. She explained that by the use of fingers the girls are taught to pull parts of their genital for a certain period of time. The genitals, especially the labia, lengthen...