Zambia’s Surprise Election

          Prior to the August 12 election in Zambia, there were widespread fears that then-President Edgar Lungu would follow the playbook of some other Africa leaders (and those outside the continent) and prevent his main opponent Hakainde Hichilema from winning through a fair vote.  State resources were used to promote Lungu, including handing farmers subsidies.  Hichilema was prevented from freely campaigning.  The electoral commission was stacked with Lungu supporters. And even some civil society figures had been coopted.

            Even though polling suggested Hichilema would win a majority of the vote in a free and fair election, it looked as though he might not get a chance to prove that prediction.

            However, Hichilema and his United Party for National Development (UPND) won with 59% of the vote – one million more votes than Lungu, preventing a second round.  Five days later, Lungu, who had initially questioned the results, conceded, and Hichilema was sworn in on August 24.  Unlike the case in the Gambia in which then-President Yahya Jammeh accepted then rejected the results, Lungu truly accepted his defeat.

Of course, there is precedent for this in Zambia.  Power changed hands twice before in elections in 1991 and 2011.  When African leader Kenneth Kaunda accepted the will of the people at the ballot box in 1991, it signaled a turning point for democracy on the continent.  His example may not have been followed by many African presidents, but some did, such as Mathieu Kérékou and Nicéphore Soglo, who traded election victories in 1991 and 1996.

Hichilema had a lot going for him in this election.  Corruption was rampant.  Double-digit inflation ran costs so high that an estimated 40% of Zambians lived on a restricted diet.  External debt rose from $1.9 billion in 2011 to $12 billion, and debt repayment soaked up funds for social programming.  People protested the situation, and Zambians had a history of taking government largesse and still voting for their preferred candidate.

Nevertheless, the UPND didn’t rely on expectations that people would turn out on their own to elect their candidate because of their dissatisfaction with the government.  Eight opposition parties, though small, were convinced to vote for Hichilema.  These parties were led by former Lungu ministers, and their support legitimized the UNDP candidate in many quarters.  Hichilema was able to broaden his support beyond the traditional areas of the country and appeal to youth, who came out to vote as a key constituency.

UPND election monitors apparently had deployed agents in almost all the 12,152 polling stations in 2021, unlike the case in 2016. This made it very difficult for the government to manipulate the vote counting.  Civil society organizations also broadly monitored the vote, but preceding the election, these groups conducted civic education to inform voters about the process and the importance of participating in it.

I observed elections and taught election observers, as well as trained political party operatives in several African countries, and I must say the Zambian election was handled by the opposition much better than many others I’ve witnessed.  Many political parties, faced with the effort Lungu made to hold onto power, would have given up and boycotted the election on the contention that a win was not possible. It has never been explained to me by  these boycotters what they hoped to gain except for highlighting the election rigging they saw in order to get the international community to reject a rigged election and refuse to establish relations with the reelected government.  What they refused to see was that the international community operates pragmatically and does business with whomever is in charge if it is felt to be strategically necessary.

African political parties also have tended to focus on one ethnic group with the voters’ expectation of getting “their slice of the political cake.”  Not reaching out to form multi-ethnic coalitions has doomed many candidacies.  Of course, it is not easy to tell one’s kin that some positions in a new government must be shared with outsiders, but it is necessary for future success in politics and government.  Younger generations seem less likely to hold onto longstanding jealousies and resentments because they have not experienced the issues firsthand that led their elders to harden their positions on solely promoting their own groups.

Ego has prevented many well-known candidates to join with one more likely to win office. Again, having political influentials agree to endorse Hichilema was key to bringing in support, not just from their parties, but also from others who saw a candidate that had broad appeal and wouldn’t govern only for his ethnic group.  The ability to bring party leaders together should become at least somewhat easier when all the independence and longtime opposition figures fade from the scene.  The feeling of deserving their chance will be lessened as new actors, hopefully more pragmatic, enter the fray.

Civil society support also was critical because parties generally don’t do civic education, and when they do, it is for their own partisans.  Civil society organizations generally are perceived to be non-partisan, which makes their efforts more acceptable to voters, especially those who haven’t made up their minds about who to vote for.  When civil society organizations have been seen as places where politicians sit out elections to wait their turn at office, they become less effective.

One hopes Hichilema’s win would be a great example for others.  After all, he had sought the presidency unsuccessfully six times before, and this is the 17th opposition win in sub-Saharan Africa since 2015.  Unfortunately, opposition parties don’t always enjoy the benefits that Hichilema and UPND were able to cobble together.  As African Arguments wrote on August 24, Zimbabwe's Nelson Chamisa and Uganda's Bobi Wine, the conditions that made it possible are not present in their respective countries.  The article stated that many Ugandans and Zimbabweans demand change, there is no similar experience of replacing the government via the ballot box to give voters confidence that their votes matter, and to empower the electoral commission to believe it is safe to announce an opposition victory.

Unfortunately, the issues that catapulted Hichilema into office are now the burdens he must bear.  Corruption is usually difficult to fully root out, but it is essential for the new Zambian government.  The country's Financial Intelligence Centre has uncovered billions of Zambian kwachas that had been laundered through high level corruption and tax evasion. In 2018, several bilateral donors withheld US$34 million designated for education and social welfare programs due to mismanagement.  The alienation youth felt that led them to overwhelmingly support Hichilema must be paid off in concrete action in terms of jobs and reforms to a system that failed to provide services or hope.

Political party support groups within the formerly ruling Patriotic Front have become quite violent, but so too have those in the UPND.  Hichilema must bring law and order to the political scene and end this destructive practice of using so-called cadres to extort money, provide informal security for party elites and disrupt opposition events.

When Levy Mwanawasa was elected president in 2001, he reversed Zambia's decline and until his death in 2008, the country enjoyed a period of economic growth due in large part to effective macroeconomic management that largely involved battling corruption. If President Hichilema is to succeed, he should study the policies Mwanawasa instituted and steer Zambia’s course back to sound, transparent management.