journalists claiming that it is in exchange for favourable coverage and promises of jobs in foreign service or in government to silence quality journalism, particularly community media. practitioners. Instead of promoting freedom of expression, it can be argued that the law effectively stifles free expression online. In such an environment, it is difficult for journalism to serve as a public “watchdog” to monitor the political processes. In its totality, it threatens freedom of the media given some of the excessive provisions it contains, which could allow for arbitrary application or targeting of critical individuals while undermining investigative journalism. Therefore, there is need for continuous capacity development for community media journalists to effectively face these challenges, As such, this has created a situation whereby media practitioners perceive a need for selfcensorship, especially when interacting with sensitive or politically exposed sources. Climate change and the media The Committee to Protect Journalists and Paradigm Initiative wrote to the UPND government to ask if it was going to honour it’s pre-election promise “to repeal or reform the Cyber Security and Cyber Crimes Act to ensure journalism is not criminalised and that the media are guaranteed the privacy they require to do their work”. (22) Climate change is a hot topic at the moment, but it’s also one that leaves audiences prone to burnout because climate change stories are always told in the negative, which creates fear. Rather than telling stories about the negative impact of a changing climate that cause anxiety among audiences, there may be a need for Zambian media to highlight ways that people are responding to these problems. Last year, the government announced that it is reviewing the Cyber Security and Cyber Crimes Act number 20 of 2021 in order to strengthen security online. The number of cyber attacks, particularly targeting financial service entities such as the Bank of Zambia (BoZ) and the National Pensions Scheme Authority (NAPSA), is also a cause for concern. Furthermore, climate change stories are often considered to be too technical, with media owners preferring to carry stories that sell — such as those about sport, business and politics. This leaves issues of climate justice being under-reported in Zambian newsrooms, while audiences are left ignorant of the effect and how best they can respond to changing weather patterns, or even how they can effectively scrutinise policy decisions or advocate for meaningful reforms. According to an opinion piece by the News Diggers newspaper of 2 July 2023, around June 2023 (23), NAPSA lost four months’ worth of data after hackers compromised their system. It said the hackers had introduced malware onto the NAPSA website, thereby gaining access to a substantial amount of data and causing disruptions in the organisation’s work. “There is a lack of education among reporters on issues to do with climate change. Most of us lag behind when it comes to topical climate change stories. We often rely on press statements because we don’t have the initiative to generate our own ideas and . . . we feel stories to do with climate change are difficult,” said a reporter from one of Zambia’s daily newspapers. Regarding the BoZ, its social media platform on Facebook was hacked and photos of a woman were posted on the BoZ Facebook cover page. (24) Community media practice “Most stories concerning land or forestry issues in the country don’t normally carry information addressing key issues surrounding our forests,” another journalist said, referring to the political angle of environmental stories. Zambian community journalists face a myriad of challenges, including difficult labour conditions and poor remuneration. “It is common to see headlines such as ‘Politicians differ over mining in lower Zambezi’ or ‘Chief in trouble for awarding land to a mine’,” she said. Politicians, powerful non-governmental organisations and other affluent Zambians use alternative and subtle ways to remunerate 91 STATE OF PRESS FREEDOM IN SOUTHERN AFRICA 2023