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After Low Registration, Zambia’s Tripartite Elections Under Threat

LUSAKA (dpa) – “Dare if you can!” was the general response Zambia’s out-going President Frederick Chiluba got when he attempted a third term bid orchestrated through his party cadres, ministers, a select group of Pentecostal churches and traditional chiefs.

Chiluba’s unpopular attempt earlier this year provoked a particular militancy that rarely shows its head among Zambians countrywide that threatened to plunge this otherwise tranquil state into chaos and bloodshed.

Civic society, opposition political parties – including Chiluba’s own republican vice president – senior cabinet ministers and members of parliament grouped up and closed ranks to block his third term bid that gobbled up millions of dollars.

Anxiety and tension reached unprecedented levels while the security situation in the country was tightened when Chiluba went through unopposed at the ruling Movement for Multi-Party Democracy (MMD) national convention last April.

Chiluba and his third term agitators conspired to block those opposing his campaign from the convention, thus effectively securing his “victory” as party president.

He increasingly became isolated as pressure mounted, coupled with a “negative recommendation” from his intelligence and service chiefs on his third term campaign.

Seventy two hours later Chiluba, incoherent in his speech, announced on state television that he would not run for a third term and dissolved his cabinet.

It was a weekend of victory celebrations for the Zambian law governing council, the three mother church bodies, an influential group on the Zambian political stage and other leading pressure groups who led the clarion call against Chiluba’s third term bid. The general populace equally celebrated.

Following Chiluba’s bowing down to pressure, the ruling MMD’s popularity waned and hit rock-bottom with the revelation of several corruption scandals involving millions of dollars all linked to senior cabinet ministers and State House.

A month later, on June 25, the Electoral Commission (EC) announced the registration of voters for this years’ tripartite elections which include the presidential elections.

It was generally expected that the anger provoked by the MMD’s campaign for Chiluba’s third term would translate into people flocking the registration centers en masse to register. However, this was not the case.

At the close of the registration period, fewer than 600,000 people had registered countrywide out of an initial five million targeted eligible voters. These poor results prompted Chiluba to intervene and the electoral commission extended the registration period for the first time in an effort to get more people on the voters’ roll.

The voters’ registration began on a dismal note and largely remained on the same note through out the three-time extension.

The legitimacy of the tripartite elections came under threat, forcing Chiluba to appeal to Zambians again and again to register as voters while civil society and opposition parties added their call to the Zambians to register.

Official statistics from the Central Statistic Office (CSO) put the number of total eligible voters at 3.5 million out of a total population of 10.2 million. However, initial statistics had put the number of eligible voters at five million.

At the last general elections in 1996, 4.5 million Zambians were recorded as eligible voters from a total population of 8.5 million but the commission registered two million people under the controversial Israeli-compiled voters’ roll with only 1.5 casting their ballots on November 18, 1996.

After a three-time extension, the EC finally closed the registration, announcing that slightly over two million people had registered.

With less than five months to go for the Presidential and parliamentary elections, Zambia continues to face serious political apathy. The legitimacy of the elections is still under threat as the reality is that “the actual number of people who will cast their votes will not go beyond half of the total number of people registered”, said N’gande Mwanaijiti, director of Inter-Africa Network for Human Rights (Afronet).

The ruling MMD is expected to rig the elections as it faces its first real challenge since it took over government in October 1991. Over the years a weak and an uncoordinated opposition has failed to dislodge the MMD from power, but tables may now be changing as realigning in the opposition takes shape.

Political observers and analysts attribute the voter apathy to the deepening social crisis, high corruption levels that have crippled development and loss of trust in the country’s political system.

Despite the country enjoying general goodwill from both bilateral and multi-lateral aid partners, little of their aid is seen to trickle down to the common Zambian.

Political observers fear that Chiluba’s government will not conduct a smooth poll following severe aid cuts by donors over governance concerns in the MMD government.

EC chairperson Justice Bobby Bwalya has ruled out the possibility of having the elections before November, while pro-MMD pressure groups are urging Chiluba to use his constitutional powers not to dissolve parliament until December to allow the EC to register more voters.

If Chiluba decides to dissolve Parliament after October, it would effectively mean that elections would be held anytime before end of February 2002.

The Republican Constitution requires that the President must call for elections 90 days after the dissolution of parliament.

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