The New Cyberlaws in Zambia: A Delicate Balance – KBF
As a legal practitioner and President of Zambia Must Prosper (ZMP), I believe it’s essential to weigh in on the two new cyberlaws in Zambia: the Cyber Security Act, 2025, and the Cyber Crime Act, 2025. These laws have the potential to shape the future of our digital landscape, and I’d like to share my thoughts on their implications.
The laws should strike a balance between regulating cyberspace and preserving freedom of expression. While it’s crucial to protect citizens from cyber threats and harassment, we must ensure that any regulations don’t stifle online discourse or creativity. The laws should be proportionate to the risks, and we must avoid restricting the rights of Zambian citizens.
The Cyber Crime Act, 2025, addresses various cybercrime offenses, including identity-related crimes. However, we need to ensure that the laws provide clear guidelines on data collection, storage, and sharing. This will not only protect individuals’ rights but also foster trust in our digital economy. Moreover, we must address concerns around surveillance and data protection, ensuring that any data collection is necessary, proportionate, and subject to robust oversight mechanisms.
A well-crafted cyberlaw framework can attract investment, promote e-commerce, and create opportunities for Zambian businesses to compete globally. The Cyber Security Act, 2025, establishes the Zambia Cyber Security Agency, which can play a crucial role in promoting cybersecurity and supporting innovation. However, we need to ensure that the Agency functions independently, with adequate checks and balances to prevent abuse of power.
Implementing and enforcing these laws will undoubtedly pose challenges. We need to address concerns around surveillance, censorship, and access to information. The laws should be designed to build trust among citizens, ensuring that their rights are protected while also promoting a safe and secure online environment. Specifically, we need to clearly define terms like “misinformation” and “national security threat” to prevent subjective interpretation and potential misuse.
We must also provide for mandatory judicial oversight for surveillance requests to ensure that security measures are proportionate and necessary. Furthermore, we need to ensure that the Zambia Cyber Security Agency functions independently, with adequate checks and balances to prevent abuse of power. The concerns raised by the Law Association of Zambia and other Civil Society Organizations, including the potential for excessive presidential powers, impact on freedom of expression, and need for broad consultations, must be taken into account.
As the UPND government implements these laws, I urge them to exercise caution and ensure that their actions align with the principles of democracy, transparency, and accountability. We must avoid using these laws as tools for suppressing dissent or restricting freedom of expression. The government should prioritize building trust with citizens, ensuring that their rights are protected, and promoting a safe and secure online environment.
By engaging in this discourse, I hope to contribute to the effective implementation of these laws and ensure that they benefit all Zambians. Let’s work together to create a digital landscape that is safe, secure, and conducive to growth and innovation.
Sincerely,
Kelvin Fube Bwalya
President, Zambia Must Prosper (ZMP)
April 27, 2025
I appreciate the government for enacting this law on social media very is total discipline no more posting insults and nakedness
If what I read is correct, this the kind of tone that one expects from the opposition. Critic and objective in nature. Laws are never perfect like anything man made.
To me what we need next are laws in the context you suggest. Privacy laws. Information about individuals is collected electronically and otherwise, what is it used for? How are individuals exposed by this information. Those collecting the information what effects under the law are they compelled to protect the private information of individuals? What are the penalities?
As we transistion from paper based sources of information, I sense that the act serve to afford us the same protections and sense of accoubtability as we got where we wrote letters to the editor or when journalists and publications wrote articles in the paper based journals we read. In the cyberspace, it has become increasingly difficult to hold individuals or institutions that perpetuate crimes and the servers are not locally based. Yet the crime is targets at Zambians? Non factual information. From gaslighting to ghosting, the abuse and crimes have caused lives to be lost. A delicate line, but a line that we need to define.
The new Cyber law should not appear to be only found in Zambia.There could be some difference here and there in application but generally it is existing in many countries.The punishment to offenders is just the same,ranging from custodial sentences to financial units equivalent or both depending on the nature of offences.The nature of offences are well articulated from one state to the other.The intensity of punishment is dependant on the vice committed and how many times on record.The Cyber law has proved to be a necessity in many countries in our world.