The Federation of African Journalists (FAJ), the African regional organisation of the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), is calling on the Zambian authorities to immediately end attacks on Zambian media as they work to establish self-regulatory mechanism.

Detaining someone without cause is against the law in Zambia. But the country’s police continue to do this, specifically targeting the female relatives of a suspect, in an attempt to gather information or force the suspect out into the open.

The Federation of African Journalists (FAJ), the African regional organisation of the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), is calling on the Zambian authorities to immediately end attacks on Zambian media as they work to establish self-regulatory mechanism.

Prisca Musonda is an ardent supporter of Patriotic Front leader Michael Sata and his party. She has travelled with him to most parliamentary constituencies campaigning in elections. But now she fears Zambia’s general elections set for 2011 could turn violent and go wrong for most voters, unless the latest spate of violence can be curbed.

Once perceived as an icon of progress in Africa thanks to wealth from its copper mines, today over 75 per cent of Zambia's population lives below the poverty line. In this week’s Pambazuka News Khadija Sharife recounts the country’s ‘riches to rags’ story – a story that is being repeated in former resource colonies across the continent, which although ‘politically liberated’ have ‘remained economically chained’.