28th February 2022
| The Public Accounts Committee wanted to know why DMMU sent invitations to various suppliers to submit quotations for the supply of 4 million 2 hundred thousand face masks without advertising the tender and why there was no evidence that the suppliers had dealt with the UNIT on similar supplies. Thus, the procurement of face masks costing more than K50.4 million was irregular. In August 2020, DMMU ordered five million forty-five thousand and sixty-six hundred and eighty-five reusable face masks for distribution to schools against the required four million two hundred thousand stated in the needs assessment resulting in an over procurement of eight hundred and forty-five thousand six hundred and eighty-five masks. On 30th July 2020 DMMU remitted K1,627,300 to the Ministry of Sports, Youth and Child Development for the purchase of face masks to be distributed in primary schools thereby resulting in the over procurement of a total of one million eight thousand four hundred and fifteen face masks costing ten million eighty-four thousand one hundred and fifty kwacha. |
1st March 2022
| Mr. Mutale, MP for Chitambo Constituency asked the Minister of Community Development and Social Services when the government will start implementing the fight against child marriage programs in Chitambo District. In her response, the Minister indicated that the Juvenile’s Act is mandated to protect and safeguard the wellbeing of children against being exposed to the risks of moral and physical danger. The Minister also observed that a lack of harmonization between statutory laws and customary laws is a challenge to fighting against child marriages in Zambia. Coordination of retrieval of children who find themselves in these marriages, awareness sensitization in communities, integrated community-level care management approach as an effective, efficient, way of addressing children and families that are involved in early marriages is what the Ministry is doing to end child marriage in Chitambo. |
2nd March 2022
| The Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation outlined issues surrounding the safety of Zambians in Ukraine. He highlighted that there were one hundred and forty-one (141) Zambian Nationals who were resident in Ukraine and out of that number twenty-seven (27) opted to remain in Ukraine while fourteen (14) were in Sumy and were unable to leave due to travel restrictions while three (3) were in Kharkiv and that arrangements were being made to facilitate their evacuation. He also highlighted that twelve (12) were in transition out of Ukraine and that a total number of eighty (80) Zambians had already been evacuated into Poland. Mr. Muyutu did ask a question to the Minister of Mines in which He wanted to find out how many companies were issued with exploration licenses countrywide from 2010 to 2020 and what companies were exploring and how many explorations were successful as of October 2021 and what the results of the Measure Mineral Resources were. The minister did indicate that the number of companies issued with exploration licenses from 2010 to 2020 was 2361. What is being explored include base metals such as Copper and Manganese, Gemstones such as emeralds, industrial minerals such as limestone, gravel, and sand, precious minerals such as gold silver, and energy minerals such as coal and uranium. He further indicated that a total number of 922 companies were successful as of October 2021 and that the findings with respect to the measure mineral resources defined included base metals, Gemstone, Industrials minerals, precious minerals, and energy minerals. |
3rd March 2022
| Mufulira Member of Parliament Golden Mwila wanted to know whether Warren Mwambazi is in order to continue chairing the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) when his company Balaam Limited has been implicated in the irregular supply of facemasks to the Disaster Management and Mitigation Unit (DMMU). In her briefing ruling on the point of order, the Speaker of the National Assembly, Mrs. Mutti said she will have to conduct a thorough investigation of what is going on in the Public Accounts Committee and render a ruling on the matter. |
4th March 2022
The Minister of Transport and Logistics issued a Ministerial statement on the increase of road traffic accidents and indicated that some of the initiatives put in place to ensure safety on the roads are; scaling up road traffic enforcement through increased patrols by the Zambia Police and RTSA in order to enforce the law and regulations issued by government, suspending of drivers’ licenses for road users that are perpetual offenders, scaling up the mounting of mobile speed cameras, scaling up road safety education, using various media platforms in order to improve road user behavior, displaying inside all public service busses the RTSA toll free line 983 and the number plate of the bus so that passengers can report an overspending bus to RTSA, enhance surveillance for long-distance busses using GPS, mitigate accidents as a result of broken down vehicles along the highways government has procured an additional toll truck, to be station in central province, government has released k4 million for road maintenance various roads, construct a dual carriageway between Ndola and Lusaka (in the long term). Amendment of the road traffic act number 11 of 2002.