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The Citizen Newspaper, Mansa (2025)

17/09/2025

Mpika Member of Parliament Francis Kapyanga has been suspended from Parliament for 14 days after being found guilty of contempt of the House.

The charge arose from an article published in a named newspaper under the headline “Stand as MP to Debate Freely, Kapyanga tells Mutti.”

17/09/2025

119 out of 156 CDF ambulances being delivered today, PS Nicholas Phiri has said

17/09/2025

ERB has confirmed a nationwide fuel shortage but assured the public that supply will stabilize this week.

16/09/2025

Kwenyu✔️ The Long awaited CDF ambulances are ready to be flagged off tomorrow for countrywide distribution.

📸 TheFalcon

14/09/2025

I Write What I Like

14.09.2025

Zambian Women’s Alcohol Problem is Our Country’s New Catastrophe

By Daimone Siulapwa

In the 1980s and 1990s, it was almost impossible to find women sitting comfortably in a bar or pub. Maybe in shebeens here and there, but certainly not at the counter of any bar.

Women who drank publicly were confined mostly to nightclubs, and society rightly regarded those night life women as exceptions, not the rule.

Forty years down the line, the picture is shocking. Today, every pub is flooded with women and many of them married, who take up the bar counter unashamedly.

The mix in bars today is a disturbing cocktail, prostitutes, side chicks, college students, divorcees, widows, single mothers, and even respectable housewives who have abandoned their homes.

The result? Men are confused. Nobody knows who is who anymore. Boundaries are blurred, respect is gone, and the consequences are catastrophic, if you know, you know.

The most devastating part is this: the very women who are meant to be the guiding force in families, the moral compasses of homes, are now drowning themselves in alcohol.

They are drinking more than their fathers ever did. And while they are busy at the counter, their children are being raised by thier maids, by TikTok, Facebook, WhatsApp, and the unforgiving streets.

Then suddenly, your 18-year-old daughter comes home pregnant. Suddenly, your son is caught on video, naked, disgracing himself for all the world to see.

And you wonder, “How did this happen?” You thought paying school fees, buying expensive phones, and sending them to private schools was enough. It was not. What they needed was your presence. What they needed was your life lessons, your guidance, your discipline and not a drunk mother at the bar counter.

Let’s face it: this is no longer an individual problem. It is a national catastrophe. Married women are competing with drunk men in taverns. Mothers are trading their dignity for beer bottles.

The home is abandoned. Children are growing up without values, without order, without respect. The family system is collapsing before our very eyes.

So, to the women of Zambia, I say this with no apology: *sober up.* If you love your children, spend less time in the bar and more time in your home. Married women, stay away from taverns. *Drunk men will never respect you when you evade thier bars.

If you want to relax, go to a proper restaurant. Sit at a table. *Guard your dignity.* Because the truth is this: alcohol does not raise children.

And to those who don’t listen, when your daughter becomes the next teenage pregnancy statistic, when your son becomes a drunkard like you or Ju**ie, when your child’s naked body is trending on social media, it won’t be bad luck. It will be the price of your negligence.

We don’t want the next generation of Zambians to grow up knowing that their mothers as the women that spent thier time with the *“Jonny solye ubwalis” of the bar.* We want them to know mothers who guided them, disciplined them, and raised them into responsible adults.

This catastrophe can be stopped. But it begins with women choosing family over alcohol, dignity over shame, and responsibility over recklessness. Zambia cannot survive if its mothers are lost in the bottle.

Daimone Siulapwa is a seasoned Political Analyst and Consultant, as well as a dedicated governance and social media activist. He is also a strong advocate for citizens’ empowerment and tribal unity. Comments, [email protected]

13/09/2025

*I Write What I Like*

*13.09.2025*

Criminalize Child Street Vending, it is a National Disgrace We Must End

By Daimone Siulapwa

It is heartbreaking, disgraceful, and shameful that in 2025, Zambia still allows children as young as five to roam the streets of Lusaka, Ndola, Kitwe, and every major town, selling products in the scorching sun, under the mercy of traffic, and in the face of predators.

This is not a sign of resilience. It is not a testimony of “hard work.” It is a clear indictment on us adults, parents, and the government. We have abandoned our children to the streets and we must be all ashamed.

We know the excuses. Life has become harder in urban areas. Divorce rates have risen. Parents die young. Some guardians live in poverty. But no excuse can justify robbing children of their childhood, education, and innocence.

The moment we normalize seeing a seven-year-old chasing cars to sell groundnuts, the moment we buy sweets from a barefooted girl along Lumumba Road, we become accomplices in destroying Zambia’s future.

Parents and guardians who push their children to the streets are not victims, they are perpetrators. Many force their children out with threats: _“If you don’t sell, you won’t eat.”_ Some even beat them for not meeting sales targets.We must stop romanticizing this wickedness. Let us call it what it is: child abuse, slavery, and exploitation.

Worse still, child street vending has become a recruitment ground for predators. These children are vulnerable to sexual molestation, manipulation, and early exposure to drugs. Studies around the world show that children exposed to the streets at a young age are more likely to become sexually active earlier, more likely to drop out of school, and more likely to fall into crime.

In Zambia, this cycle is already visible. We are manufacturing tomorrow’s broken adults by our silence today.

It is important to remind ourselves that Zambia already has a strong legal framework in the Children’s Code Act of 2022, which clearly prohibits economic exploitation and any work that interferes with a child’s education or wellbeing. Yet, enforcement remains weak and inconsistent.

Parliament has a solemn duty not only to strengthen these provisions but also to ensure that implementation is uncompromising. Lawmakers cannot sit comfortably in the National Assembly while our CBDs are turned into breeding grounds for child labour. The Children’s Code Act must be backed by tough penalties and dedicated enforcement mechanisms if it is to mean anything at all.

We need a bold, uncompromising stand: criminalize child street vending. Punish parents and guardians who send their children to sell on the streets. Jail them. Fine them. Strip them of custody if necessary.

This is not cruelty. it is justice. Protecting children requires tough laws and enforcement, not empty sympathy.

If this sounds radical, then let us ask ourselves: what if that little barefooted girl running between buses in Cairo Road was your daughter? What if the boy harassed by drunkards in Ndola’s CBD was your son? Would you still look the other way?

Would you still buy a packet of lemons and smile, pretending you have “helped”? No. You would be outraged. You would demand protection. So why do we remain silent when it is someone else’s child?

The government must also take its share of blame. Social welfare programs are weak. Schools are failing to retain vulnerable children. Local councils are more interested in chasing street vendors than rescuing children who sell bananas at midnight.

This is a gross dereliction of duty. Protecting children should be the first mandate of any serious government.

But society too has become complicit. By buying from child vendors, we reward their exploitation. We empower abusive guardians. We keep children away from classrooms. We normalize poverty and recycle suffering.

*Next time you buy lemons from a child on the street, remember: you are paying for that child’s stolen childhood.*

This is a national tragedy. If we do not act now, Zambia will raise a generation of children who know the streets better than the classroom, who know abuse before love, and who know survival before dignity. This is not the Zambia we want.

As a matter of urgency, Zambia must establish an independent *Ministry of Children and Youth,* as opposed to the current youth and sports portfolio.

Children and youth now make up nearly 70% of our population, yet their welfare and future are reduced to an afterthought. We need a ministry exclusively focused on protecting children, empowering young people, and grooming them into capable leaders who can drive this country out of the poverty trap that our generation has failed to escape. Without such institutional focus, all our talk of development will remain empty rhetoric.

It is time for Parliament to act. We need a Child Protection Bill that makes child street vending a criminal offense. We need community taskforces that rescue children from abusive guardians. We need rehabilitation centers and safe spaces for rescued children. And above all, we need the courage as citizens to say: this ends now.

Daimone Siulapwa is a seasoned Political Analyst and Consultant, as well as a dedicated governance and social media activist. He is also a strong advocate for citizens’ empowerment and tribal unity. Comments, [email protected]

12/09/2025

Chama North MP Yotam Mtayachalo has rejected the impeachment push against President Hakainde Hichilema, saying it's unworkable and a waste of time.

He advises focusing on party mobilization instead.

08/09/2025

Levy Ngoma Challenges Church to Bold on Morality

Special Assistant to the President for Politics, Levy Ngoma, has challenged the church to be bold in its role of providing moral and spiritual direction to the nation.

Mr. Ngoma reiterated that President Hakainde Hichilema remains committed to upholding Zambia’s status as a Christian nation.

Speaking during a meeting with over 70 clergy members from the Mpulungu Pastors Fellowship last evening, Mr. Ngoma emphasized that Zambia will continue to embrace its Christian identity.

He also stressed the importance of maintaining a strong and respectful relationship between the government and the church.

Meanwhile, Reverend Christopher Phiri called on the government to review the registration process for churches, noting that the fees are prohibitively high. He added that many churches are struggling with the burden of annual returns.

Reverend Paul Mwansa urged Zambians to take seriously the declaration of Zambia as a Christian nation, while Reverend William Mwambazi appealed for government support toward the Mpulungu Pastors Fellowship cooperative.

ZNBC

08/09/2025

“You can not reinstate benefits on a co**se…a co**se has no rights” - Lungu Family Lawyer

08/09/2025

*A Word of Caution to Lusaka City Council*

The Lusaka City Council must be reminded that public office is not a license for recklessness or poor judgment. The recent notice announcing the closure of several critical roads in Lusaka to accommodate a private marathon is both misplaced and counterproductive.

At a time when Lusaka residents are already grappling with unbearable congestion, lost business hours, and suffocating inefficiency in movement, the Council has chosen to further punish citizens in favor of an event that is neither national in character nor in any way essential to public service delivery.

*Why should private events override the daily struggles of ordinary Zambians and businesses that pay taxes and sustain the very Council that now treats them with such disdain?*

The Council ought to have shown wisdom by relocating such marathons to less congested zones, or at the very least creating alternative arrangements that balance recreation with economic activity. Instead, Lusaka is yet again held hostage by poor planning and misplaced priorities.

To worsen the insult, the Council cannot even spell correctly the very road names they claim to manage. *Roads such as Nationalist are reduced to “Nationlist,” Kabulonga to “Kabulong,” Kapwepwe to “Kapweepwe,” and Thabo Mbeki to “Thabo Mbiki.”* This is not just carelessness; it is symptomatic of institutional decay.

08/09/2025

The Pretoria High Court in South Africa has adjourned proceedings for a few minutes as it awaits judgment. At this stage, both the applicant and the respondent have made their submissions on whether the High Court should allow the matter to proceed to the Supreme Court.
The family of the late former President Edgar Lungu argues that the lower court cannot serve as the final authority in this case. Meanwhile, the government maintains that the earlier judgment on the repatriation must be upheld.

04/09/2025

The Lusaka Magistrate Court has sentenced convicted former Secretary to the Treasury Fredson Yamba to 3 years imprisonment with hard labour, while former Foreign Affairs Minister, Joe Malanji has been sentenced to 4 years with hard labour.

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