Police Deputy Inspector General Solomon Jere says he will not tolerate what he called “immoral dressing” by some Zambian women.
Facing a spate of criticism in response to earlier statements on the subject, Dr Jere has insisted that a “culture of indecent dressing by some Zambian women had degenerated to alarming levels.”
He said Zambia was under siege from many wrongs, citing a recent incident in Central Province in vulgar detail involving a woman who had discovered her husband in an act of infidelity, resulting in an injury to her genitals.
“There is absolutely nothing wrong with keeping in tune with latest trends in fashion, but we must strike a line on what is indecent and decent,” said Dr Jere. “There are women who are walking about almost naked in public. Some of these garments are so revealing. In our culture, there are certain parts of the body that must not be exposed to the public, especially for a woman. These are the body parts many of our women want the public to see.”
Many progressive groups in Zambia were taken aback by the police chief’s statements, which they found offensive despite the traditionally conservative societal norms (for example, homosexuality and pornography are also aggressively outlawed by police in Zambia).
Speaking in Lusaka on Saturday, the police chief fired back at criticism from local NGOs who condemned his statements as chauvinistic and sexist. Jere told the NGOs that they must realise that there was a lot of truth when he said many women were corrupting people’s minds by their indecent dressing, and further warned that the police would not sit idle and watch the situation go unabated.
Dr Jere admitted that the weekend newspapers were always splashed with pictures of half-naked women, but he defended the media for publishing the pictures, saying the journalists were merely showing the indecency that was already in the public domain.
For example, the government-loyal Weekend Post newspaper has become widely known for publishing graphic images of women and sexually suggestive dance postures. Last weekend, The Post carried two photographs of an upcoming artist performing at one of Lusaka’s night spots, featuring a “wardrobe malfunction” exposure of nudity.
“As the police service, we are here to maintain order in society and we have observed the dressing by many of our women. The dressing by some of the women, including elderly one is not only offensive, but it also goes against our own cultural norms. For example, some pregnant women are wearing certain clothes that a normal pregnant woman cannot wear in our society,” he said.
Dr Jere said the law would start visiting those who were in the habit of dressing indecently – although he announced no plans to hold media to account for publishing the photos and profiting from circulation of allegedly obscene materials.
He said the Zambia Police Service had embarked on a community exercise to sensitise the masses on dressing, defilement, sexual assault and other vices in society. He said the his office had kicked off the exercise in Lusaka’s Linda township, on of the capital city’s compounds and densely populated locations.
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