which acted as a catalyst to professional conduct. To this effect, the Authority wishes to thank all stakeholders, state and non-state actors that played a role in conducting capacity building for different media personnel. The IBA wishes to reiterate its call to all broadcasting stations to continue to work in an ethical and professional manner in accordance with the IBA Act even now that the elections have come to an end. The coverage may be attributed to the level of preparedness for the elections by most media houses. For example, the majority of survey respondents described their media house’s level of preparedness as “very good” as shown in Chart 1.2 below: Other stakeholders, such as the European Union Observer Mission (EOM) described the media landscape before and during the elections as “highly polarised”, with the ruling party monopolising prime-time on both state and private media2. According to the EOM preliminary statement on the August 2 For example, in June, the ruling PF was reported as threatening to sue media houses that would not block other political parties during prime-time slots according to advertising agreements signed with the party. See PF threatens to sue media houses if they fail to block other advertisers during election eve rally – Zambia: News Diggers! 14