Crackdown in Zambia

Proposed constitutional reforms that would sharply increase President Edgar Lungu’s powers ahead of elections in 2021 are stoking concerns about Zambia’s democratic credentials, analysts and civil society groups say.

Bill number 10 is to be discussed soon by parliament, where the ruling Patriotic Front (PF) holds a majority.

Lungu, in power since 2015, faces mounting complaints that he is cracking down on dissent and seeking to consolidate power.

If approved, the changes will allow the head of state to nominate judges and ministers, change the electoral layout and take control of central bank monetary policy.

“The Bill is the grave digger of Zambia’s democracy and the country’s worst constitutional amendment since the achievement of independence in 1964,” said professor Sishuwa Sishuwa from the University of Zambia.

The Bill would “make it effectively impossible to remove President Edgar Lungu from office,” he added.

Zambia has enjoyed relative stability since its first multiparty election in 1991, which ousted the country’s long-running postindependence leader, Kenneth Kaunda.

Lungu initially replaced president Michel Sata, who died unexpectedly in 2014.

Lungu then won the presidency in his own right in 2016 but the polls were marked by clashes between PF supporters and those of the rival United Party for National Development (UPND).

The president has since taken an increasingly authoritarian stance against his rivals.

Election runner-up Hakainde Hichilema, who refused to accept the results, was jailed for four months in 2017 for allegedly refusing to give way to a motorcade transporting Lungu.

Hichilema was held on treason charges, an offence that carries the death penalty. He claims his arrest was “political”.

Tensions rose again last year, when the president successfully asked the constitutional court to allow him to run again in 2021 so as not to “plunge the country into chaos.”

The opposition and civil society figures say this breaches the constitution which limits the president to two terms while Lungu, if reelected in 2021, would in effect have served three times.

Lungu shows no sign of backing down. – AFP

The Bill is the country’s worst constitutional amendment since the achievement of independence in 1964.

Sishuwa Sishuwa University of Zambia