The Zambia Information and Communications Technology Authority (ZICTA) says the enactment of the proposed ICT bills by Parliament will help address some of the challenges facing the ICT sector in Zambia.
ZICTA Director General Patrick Mutimushi said the Authority is hopeful that Parliament will in the current sitting pass the Electronic Commerce and Transactions, the Cyber Security and Cybercrime and the Data Protection Bills.
Mr Mutimushi observed that an effective regulatory framework is crucial to the continued growth of the ICT sector.
He said the three bills once enacted will address issues of customer data protection and will also safeguard all electronic based transactions.
Mr Mutimushi was speaking in Lusaka this morning when he officiated at the launch of the Digital Channel Platform dubbed ZamSellit at Zamtel House.
ZamSellit is a Digital Channel Platform that allows Zamtel customers to buy and sell talk time electronically from their mobile phones and earn a commission.
“The ICT sector in Zambia has continued to record impressive growth over the years. It is evident that ICT tools have now become part of our everyday existence whether for personal use or business. It is therefore critical from a regulatory perspective, that we continue to evolve in order to create a regulatory regime that speaks to the current sector challenges and opportunities,” Mr Mutimushi said.
He added, “It is in this vein that we remain hopeful that Parliament will in the current sitting which commenced on Tuesday be able to enact the proposed bills namely the Electronic Commerce and Transactions Bill, the Cyber Security and Cybercrime Bill and the Data Protection Bill. We believe that an effective regulatory framework is crucial to the continued growth of the ICT sector.”
Mr Mutimushi commended Zamtel for the innovation saying ZICTA is interested in seeing a future where paper based scratch cards will not exist.
And Zamtel Chief Executive Officer Sydney Mupeta said the launch of ZamSellit marks a great step in the company’s plans to fully digitalise its channels.
Mr Mupeta said Zamtel customers can also use ZamSellit to trade in talk time electronically thereby eliminate the use of physical scratch cards.
He said the launch of ZamSellit is also a response to the recent incident where some unauthorized Zamtel scratch cards were found on the streets.
“The DCP is also a key step in ensuring that our business partners and customers receive a more convenient and faster and secure service,” Mr Mupeta said.
He said the DCP will bring about a more permanent solution to addressing the challenges of stock leakages and bring about convenience to all strategic partners along the distribution value chain.
Who cares.
I had sausage and eggs with bacon and toast.
In Zambia people are not having this.
So zicta or not. I don’t care much sorry.
Also orange juice which is concentrated. It’s that nice one with bits inside.
I’m lucky.
Thanks
BB2014,2016
Why people don’t like what Dr. Mushota showed off above? Infact she wrote “she is lucky”.
Truly how many of us have privilege to eat in morning?
And it will be worse when people like Mushota will be mistreated by new PF bill.
Sydney the Engineer masquerading as CEO ..when are you going to announce profits …forever launching things and wasting money.
Give us the Access to Information Bill noti ifyo ifyabupuba ifyama ZICTA.
Good initiatives have started coming out of Zamtel.
Moses P. Sichula – there is nothing they are doing just wasting funds and expenditure my friend …
Dr. Mushota. Please be thankful to God that he made you to be where you are right now and be nice to our fellow Zambians who did not have the privilege to be in UK because you never know what holds tomorrow. Please stop showing off like that and be good.
Are you new to LT…that blogger you mention is an LT admin account …meant to crank up traffic like you are doing.
Doing away with paper based scratch cards will translate into massive loss of employment for all that sell them and they are just too many. Please do not do it at least for now.
Is it Zamtel’s mandate to create employment? If doing away with paper scratch cards leads to cost savings and maybe even increased revenue, then so be it!
Zamtel with Sydney will never declare profits especially under PF …to them its just a Cash cow…you need a new breed of mindset to run that company like a Private entity get rid of all the waste all those girlfriends of ministers offered ssseeexx for jobs positions in there.
Send Sydney to the cool environment of the server room bring in a seasoned CEO from business background with an MBA.