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Submission to the 88th Session of the Human Rights Committee: October 2006:
Conscientious Objection to Military Service: Issues for the Task Forces on State Reports
ZAMBIA
(This briefing has been compiled without reference to the Third Periodic Report of the State Party, which is not publicly available at the time of writing.)
Summary
The issue of conscientious objection is hitherto known to have arisen in Zambia not with regard to military service, but with regard to the requirement that pupils in state schools sing the national anthem and salute the flag.
As such conscientious objections might also arise with regard to compulsory programmes of military training in educational establishments, and as even within all-volunteer armed forces the possibility cannot be preculded that a serviceman or servicewoman might develop a conscientious objection to military service, for instance as the result of change of religion, a clear statement in law of the right of conscientious objection to military service could afford valuable protection to possible future conscientious objectors.
Military recruitment is voluntary in Zambia; there are not known to be any legislative provisions recognising the right of conscientious objection to military service; nor however have there hitherto been any reports of persons claiming such a right.
However, following the State Party’s Second Periodic Report, the Human Rights Committee observed: “The requirement to sing the national anthem and salute the flag as a condition of attending a State school, despite conscientious objection, appears to be an unreasonable requirement and to be incompatible with articles 18 and 24 of the Covenant.” [1]. Objections to such acts, while of course not in themselves objections to military service, are often an integral part of the beliefs on which conscientious objections to military service are based. In this context, it has been reported that three months’ military training (linked to a two-year programme of development service entitled Zambian National Service, or ZNS) was at least at one time compulsory for fifth form school leavers, university graduates and government officials.[2] We have no details of the case of Kachasu v. Attorney-General in which the issue of conscientious objection to the national anthem and saluting the flag was raised, but it would be surprising if such objections existed without there being any objectors to participating in military training.
CPTI recommends:
- that the State Party be asked whether the ZNS or any other scheme involving compulsory military training is still in force, and encouraged to ensure that conscientious objectors to military service are excused from any such training.
- that, as with other countries whose armed forces rely upon voluntary recruitment, the State Party be encouraged to make a clear statement in law of the right to have or to develop a conscientious objection to military service, so as to afford protection of that right to all, including those who have already enlisted in the armed forces.
25th September, 2006.
[1] CCPR/C/79/Add.62, 3rd April 1996, Para 18
[2] Horeman, B. & Stolwijk, M., Refusing to Bear Arms, War Resisters International, London, 1998