By BARBARA CHANDA
MINISTER of Community Development, Mother and Child Health Joseph Kasonde says the ministry is assessing the plight of the abandoned children of the incestuous couple of Serenje.
Dr Katema said it was unfortunate that the innocent children have been abandoned by their extended family and the community.
He said in an interview in Lusaka yesterday that community development officers from both Lusaka and Serenje are on the ground assessing the situation of the five children.
The minister said if the children are in dire need of assistance, they will be taken on by the ministry’s social welfare department.
Dr Katema said every child in Zambia has a right to a good living.
The children are a product of a strange marriage between a man and his biological younger sister in Serenje. They have been married since 1999.
After Nicholas Mukuwa Bulaya, 38, and Bertha Chipapuka, 35, were arrested and charged for incest, their relatives and community abandoned the five children, who are now reportedly living on their own at their parents’ farm.
The oldest child is 15 years old and the youngest, who is 11 months old, is with its mother, who is in detention.
The couple appeared in the Serenje Magistrate’s Court last week.
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