ZAMBIA: Baboon "Engineer" Cuts Power In Livingstone, Zambia

An "Engineer" baboon in Zambia has tampered with the cables at a power station in the south of the country leaving 50,000 people without electricity.

The country’s power producer, ZESCO, confirmed to local media that the baboon had accidentally tampered with high voltage machines. The resulting blackout he said affected about 50,000 customers living in Livingstone and the Western province.

It caused the blackout on Sunday morning by climbing into the power station and pulling at the lines.

The baboon survived the "massive electric shock" that would have killed a human being, a power company spokesman said.
A person would also have been prosecuted, Henry Kapata added.

The animal according to ZESCO spokesperson, Henry Kapata, has since been handed over to the Zambia Wildlife Authority (ZAWA) and is currently in Intensive Care Unit.

The lines the baboon was tampering with are extremely high voltage. You can see that it was electrocuted in so many ways but it has survived. It is an animal, we cannot prosecute it otherwise if it was a human we would have taken it to court.

The baboon was rescued by a wildlife organisation and is now recovering but has serious wounds.

The power station is in the Zambian tourist city of Livingstone, where it is common for wild animals to be roaming around as it near a national park.

Electricity has now been restored to the affected customers in Livingstone and the nearby Western Province.

The baboon tampered with the A station and the B3 and B5 machines in our power station cutting electricity to Western Province and of course Livingstone town so we have about 28,000 customers in Livingstone and 22,000 customers in Western Province.

So the baboon cut our power station around 06:50 hours, Kapata said.

The lines the baboon was tampering with are extremely high voltage.

You can see that it was electrocuted in so many ways but it has survived. It is an animal, we cannot prosecute it otherwise if it was a human we would have taken it to court.

Zambia, a major copper producer has been in a politically tensed state following disputed elections held in August last year. The President declared a state of emergency recently after a market fire believed to have been cause by acts of sabotage.

It’s main opposition chief is in jail pending a treason trial for blocking the presidential motorcade months back. The main opposition bloc in parliament has also been suspended for disobeying the president. Civil society groups in the country have voiced concerns over the ‘charged’ political atmosphere.

In a similar incident last year, a monkey caused a nationwide power outage in Kenya.

A single monkey caused a nationwide blackout in Kenya after falling on to a crucial piece of equipment.

The monkey fell on a transformer at the Gitaru hydroelectric power station on Tuesday, electricity provider KenGen said in a statement.

The transformer then tripped, resulting in the loss of 180 megawatts of power and triggering a blackout across Kenya.

Power was restored almost four hours later and the monkey survived its adventure, KenGen said.

It was taken away by the Kenya Wildlife Service.

KenGen power installations are secured by electric fencing which keeps away marauding wild animals, the statement said.

"We regret this isolated incident and the company is looking at ways of further enhancing security at all our power plants."

Businesses suffered as a result of the Monkey adventures that caused the blackout.

Many had installed generators as a result of previous blackouts, it said.




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ZAMBIA: Tourism Expo Opens

The mighty Victoria Falls, aka 'Mosi oa Tunya | The Smoke That Thunders' is just one of the many attractions which feature prominently at ZATEX 2016, short for Zambia Tourism Expo. The second edition of the event went underway yesterday in the capital city of Lusaka.

Venue is the sprawling complex of the Mulungushi International Conference Centre where nearly 50 exhibitors from Zambia, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Malawi, the Seychelles, Mozambique, Botswana but notably also from as far as Indonesia are showcasing their companies and attractions.
RETOSA, the Regional Tourism Organization of Southern Africa, which brings together 15 member countries, was also represented at the expo.

65 hosted buyers had come to Zambia to meet the local tourism industry, as well as regional tourism authorities like Zimbabwe, airlines present like RwandAir - one of the key sponsors of ZATEX 2016 - Air Namibia or local carrier ProFlight, to talk business and the 'speed dating' set up in the afternoon turned out to be a beehive of activities as buyers and sellers met face to face though working on the clock. This was later followed at an easier pace when the Radisson Blu Lusaka hosted all participants, invited guests from Lusaka's business community and the media for a social evening which turned out to be more of a second networking event then a mere cocktail party.

Main host, Zambia Tourism Agency's CEO Mr. Felix Chaila, welcomed his guests, who came from as far as Japan, India, Germany, France and the UK while African participants traveled to Lusaka from South Africa, neighbouring Zimbabwe, Botswana, Namibia, Angola, Mozambique, Rwanda, Kenya, Tanzania including Zanzibar, Uganda but also Ghana.

While, in comparison to last week's Sanganai 2016 - Zimbabwe's 15th edition of their tourism trade show, ZATEX was more compact, it is a valiant effort to showcase Zambia's tourism attractions, given that this is only the second edition of the event and that the dates, due to circumstances beyond ZTA's control had to be shifted. Nevertheless has the exhibition literally doubled in size compared to the inaugural event in 2015, a sign that Zambia may at last become the 'en vogue' destination the local tourism marketers were long hoping for.

Twelve travel trade journalists too attended the show on invitation of Zambia Tourism, aiming to make an impact in their home countries like India, South Africa, Germany, France but also Angola, Zimbabwe and Uganda, where global market leader's eTurboNews Africa Correspondent is based.

Today's proceedings will be marked by the official opening of ZATEX 2016. Zambia's Minister for Tourism and Art, the Hon. Jean Kapata will tour the exhibition in the morning to meet hosted buyers, exhibitors and the media. She will then, later in the afternoon, invite the Guest of Honour who is none other than President Edgar Lunga to officially open the event.