STATE OF THE MEDIA IN ZAMBA

access to information in the country because of its immense value to the people
of Zambia. Mr Malama said access to information by every citizen underpinned
the whole project to ensure majority of the people had access to information.
“The digital migration is one of the huge projects undertaken by this government
and it has come to stay, and it has already commenced as evidenced by the
fact that we are currently transmitting to so many channels on the TopStar
platform” According to the implementation plan, it is envisaged that the country
will completely go digital by 31st December 2017.19
Digital migration has also dragged in Zambia and has had a lot of legal issues
surrounding it. One can only hope that this road map will yield the much
anticipated results and that many local people in the rural areas will not be cut
off.
6.0 Online Media
The major highlights of the quarter under review regarding the online media
sector was the by the Zambia Information Communication Technology Authority
(ZICTA) who unearthed a scam in which in which some international criminals
from countries like Nigeria are purported to have been using innocent Zambians
to open bank accounts which these scammers were accessing after further
encouraging the unsuspecting victims to open parallel accounts on Face book
through which they were duping Zambians to deposit money in form of
promotions. The Authority disclosed that a number of college and university
students were being used to open bank accounts after being given some
money.
ZICTA director of support services Mofya Chisala said that after being enticed to
open bank accounts, the victims were being instructed to open fake
competition accounts on Face book where they were requested to deposit
money. Mr. Chisala added that whenever the victim deposited the money in
one of the accounts, the tricksters would access it from any part of the world
where they were located “International criminals from countries like Nigeria and
other countries are using greedy Zambians to swindle innocent people without
19 Times of Zambia 7th June 2017

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