THREE universities have been selected to represent Zambia in next year’s Zain Africa Challenge.

The universities that will shrug it out during the season four of the contest are University of Zambia, Zambia Adventist University and Copperbelt University.
Throughout the competition each university will be represented by three students, bringing up the total number of participants to nine.

Announcing the representatives after the national qualifying tournament held at Cresta Golf View in Lusaka, Zain Zambia marketing director Evans Muhanga said the three universities were among the six drawn from Copperbelt, Lusaka and Southern provinces.

‘The trio will take on other universities from seven countries across East, Central and West Africa at the international festivals to be held in Kampala, Uganda,” Muhanga said.
The other remaining universities that took part in the competition were Cavendish, Copperstone and Zambia Open University.

“The future of the country lies in the youths. And today’s display goes to show that indeed we have a bright future,” he added.
Muhanga has commended the six universities that took part in the national qualifying tournament.

And Zain Zambia managing director David Holiday said Zain was committed to education in all their operations through the “Build our nation initiative”
“We are refurbishing needy schools and bringing them to habitable standards so that students and teachers alike can perform to desired expectations,” said Holiday.

One of the qualifiers from University of Zambia (UNZA) school of Natural Sciences, Kalombo Chilongoshi has called upon the three Universities going to Kampala to work as a team.

“I am urging my fellow participants from CBU and Zambia Adventist University to work as team where we are going. Hard work begins now, out there the competition is tight, and we need to uplift our standards, knowing the fact that most of the universities in the competition are first class universities,” said Kalombo.

And Copperstone University participant, Cherry Muchindu expressed happiness after their school emerged fourth, adding that despite people thinking the Copperstone University is not recognized, it has still performed well.

“Competing with universities such as UNZA and CBU has made us gain experience. Such tournaments are beneficial even if you do not reach the finals, for they can help in developing your Intelligence Quotient (IQ),” said Cherry.

However, in the Zain Africa Challenge season three, Ibadan University of Nigeria made successful debut by winning the Zain scholars trophy and won US$50,000.00 beating 31 other universities from across Africa.

The runners up were Kenyatta University of Kenya, who walked away with US$35,000.00, while UNZA emerged third and won themselves US$25,000.00 in institutional grants.