David Julian Wightman

Author Bio

About David Julian Wightman

David Julian Wightman is a Zambian-Canadian journalist and human rights activist.

How much will we bare under the Threatened State of Emergency
By David Julian Wightman on July 8, 2017
Speaking upon his return to Zambia from the AU conference in Addis, President Edgar Lungu asked the nation to bare with him as his government....
Zambia’s war on cannabis is insane, immoral
By David Julian Wightman on June 18, 2017
The headline is no exaggeration: the war on cannabis currently being waged by the Drug Enforcement Commission and Zambian judges and magistrates is completely insane....
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Exchanging nude photos privately shouldn’t be a crime
By David Julian Wightman on June 10, 2017
Imagine sitting in your living room watching TV and noticing someone outside looking in your window. How would you feel? What if that stranger is....
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Against Cultural Conservatism
By David Julian Wightman on May 27, 2017
Cultural conservatism is once again rearing its ugly head in Zambia, in strange and somewhat contradictory ways. First there was that bizarre bit of news,....
Rastafari: Roots and repression in Zambia
By David Julian Wightman on May 10, 2017
Rastafari have become a common sight in Zambia, easily identified by their dreadlocks, “Rasta rainbow” colours, and their entrepreneurship as artists, musicians, and painters. While....
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Screw the Death Penalty
By David Julian Wightman on May 3, 2017
Question: How can a nation self-declared as “Christian” sentence a woman to death on the anniversary of the execution of the Messiah? This is not....
A Brief History of the Police State in Zambia
By David Julian Wightman on April 25, 2017
“I have no particular love for the idealized “worker” as he appears in the bourgeois Communist’s mind, but when I see an actual flesh-and-blood worker....
The Economics of Legal Weed
By David Julian Wightman on April 10, 2017
To my mind, the strongest reason to overturn cannabis prohibition is on moral grounds. Caging millions of non-violent people worldwide for cultivating, distributing, or consuming....
President Trump is no friend of Africa
By David Julian Wightman on April 1, 2017
US President Donald Trump has a significant fanbase here in Africa. This is due in part to his populist rhetoric, as African voters are similarly....
In Defence of Informal Traders
By David Julian Wightman on March 20, 2017
I love salaula shopping. Not only is it one of my favourite things to do in Lusaka, but also I have taken people―including the reviewer....