On October 18, 2002, the Freedom of Information (2002) bill, along with the Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA) and Zambia National Broadcasting Corporation Amendment bills, was gazetted in the Government Gazette number 5134 and publicized in the national dailies for public awareness and consensus building. This exerted more pressure on the government such that on November 5, 2002, Parliament rejected this and two other private members bills namely the Independent broadcasting Authority and Broadcasting (2002) bills by evoking article 81 of the Zambian Constitution and Section 76 of the Standing orders requiring bills with financial implications to be consented to by the President, through the Vice President or the Minister of Finance, before being brought to Parliament. This took place just before the government gazetted and published their bills; namely the Freedom of Information bill, the Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA) bill and the Zambia National Broadcasting Corporation (Amendment) bill, 2002. Much of the content in the FOI and IBA bills the government finally presented was borrowed from the private bills. Fliers explaining the FOI bill continued to be distributed during this period and raised more awareness on this piece of legislation. Printing of fliers was paid for by MISA. Field visits to ZIMA’s institutional members that include radio Icengelo, Chikaya, Maria, Breeze FM, Mazabuka, Sky FM, Chikuni, Lyambai were also conducted to raise more awareness on this and the two legislations. The FOI bill was deferred to facilitate more consultation by the government and no indication of when the bill will be brought back was given. ZIMA however is going ahead to reintroduce the debate on the introduction of the Freedom of Information Bill in Parliament. To achieve this, several activities including seminars, workshops and publicity techniques have been put in place. ZIMA seriously takes the view that Freedom of the Press must be properly enshrined in the Constitution of Zambia. This is not the case at the moment as this clause comes broadly under “Freedom of Expression” in the current Constitution. ZIMA, therefore held a one-day workshop on the Protection of freedom of the press under the constitution, for its members whose aim was to stimulate suggestions from members about the kinds of improvement that should be made to the Constitution to protect Press Freedom. The workshop attended by 32 participants recommended that Press Freedom and right to access to state held information should be specifically included in the Constitution. It was also recommended that the mode of the adoption of the Constitution should be by a Constituent Assembly while the Bill of Rights should be amended through a referendum. 9