6.3. Alerts/Selected news stories (News Diggers) 13th July COUNCIL of Churches in Zambia (CCZ) general secretary Fr Emmanuel Chikoya says he has noted with concern continued poor coverage of opposition candidates on the national broadcaster ZNBC, ahead of next month’s polls. And Fr Chikoya says there is still room for political dialogue to happen among stakeholders before the August elections. In an interview, Fr Chikoya said it was unfair that opposition presidential candidates were still not televised on ZNBC main news. https://diggers.news/local/2021/07/13/poor-coverage-of-opposition-parties-on-znbc-worries-council-ofchurches/ 21st July TRANSPARENCY International Zambia (TIZ) has revealed that in June, PF spent K6.05 million on campaign billboards across the country, followed by Socialist party at K2.26 million and UPND at K1.31 million. In a statement, with regards to TIZ’s 2021 Elections Project, TIZ executive director Maurice Nyambe noted that for the month of June, the expenditure on presidential billboards in Lusaka increased significantly with PF spending at least K4.488 million, UPND K723,000, and the Socialist Party K1.195 million. https://diggers.news/local/2021/07/21/pf-tops-campaign-spending-with-k6-million-splashed-onbillboards-reveals-tiz/ 28th July The Patriotic Front has threatened to sue several radio and television stations, among them Flava, Mano Radio, Icengelo and KNC in Kabwe, if they fail to block out other advertisers during the planned ruling party’s election eve rally PF secretary general Davies Mwila has threatened to take legal action against Flava FM, Diamond TV and several others for “failing to adhere to an advertising agreement” signed with the party in March https://diggers.news/local/2021/07/28/pf-threatens-to-sue-media-houses-if-they-fail-to-block-otheradvertisers-during-election-eve-rally/ 28th July GOVERNMENT has condemned the reported violence allegedly perpetrated by UPND cadres against a ZANIS District Information Officer for Ikelenge district in North-Western Province. In a statement, Tuesday, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting Services Permanent Secretary Amos Malupenga said Journalists needed to conduct their work without fear or intimidation and further called on the police to bring the culprits to book. https://diggers.news/local/2021/07/28/govt-condemns-upnd-cadres-violence-against-journalist/ 13th August ZAMBIAN voters were today taken to a rude shock after noticing that the government shut down WhatsApp, Facebook and Twitter, the most commonly used instant messaging platforms, as they queued up to cast their votes in the crucial general election. WhatsApp was the first to go down slightly after noon and many mobile subscribers took to Facebook to share their displeasure and to offer peer solutions to circumvent the government measure; advising netizens to switch to Virtual Private Networks (VPNs). At around 17:00 hours Facebook also got restricted, followed by Twitter, leaving Zambians with no effective social media platform with which to share stories and developments during the counting of votes. There are growing fears that all other social media platforms, such as Telegram and signal would be shut down as polls come to a close at 18:00 hours to pave way for the vote count. 43