Politicians urged to end by-election violence

A leading election monitoring group has called for politicians to rein in their supporters after clashes between ruling Movement for Multi-party Democracy (MMD) and opposition militants in Zambia's North Western and Western provinces ahead of two by-elections this month. Alfred Chanda, head of the Foundation for a Democratic Process (FODEP), told IRIN on Tuesday: "We as FODEP and other election monitoring groups are hopeful that the violence will not continue until election day, but looking at the issue realistically, the violence is likely to continue." At a press conference last week, Chanda warned that "the party cadres have been fighting in the presence of their senior party stalwarts, especially from the ruling MMD, which is bad because it [makes it seem like] the violence is being condoned by the party leadership." But MMD spokesperson Akashambakwa Mbikusita-Lewanika condemned the violence. "An election should not be treated as a matter of life and death ... it's but a process where people choose who to represent them in parliament and violence must be treated as criminal regardless of ones party affiliation." In one clash the provincial minister for Western province, Simasiku Namakando, was hospitalised after being attacked by opposition militants near Kaoma, 500 km west of the capital Lusaka, where one of the two by-elections is due. FODEP, which has stationed observers in "hot spots", believes that the violence could be the result of the ruling party bussing in supporters from its urban strongholds in Lusaka and the central Copperbelt region, and allegedly fraudulently registering them as voters. "We have confirmed reports of MMD supporters obtaining national registration cards [crucial to getting voters cards] at odd hours ... In the absence of strong electoral laws, these problems may continue," Chanda said. "If you ask me, I would say the opposition must stop contesting these by-elections because they are simply legitimising an illegitimate electoral process and giving the MMD what appears like a 'genuine' majority," political analyst Robby Makayi told IRIN. "Violence cannot end as long as the opposition feel cheated," noted Masauso Phiri, editor-in-chief of the Today newspaper. He added that President Levy Mwanawasa's administration had inherited a political machine geared to winning at all costs from his predecessor, Frederick Chiluba, and had "refined it". The ruling party has won all four of the last by-elections, and has 72 MPs out of 150 elected members in parliament. Its closest rival, the United Party for National Development (UPND), has 44 MPs. Five seats are vacant because lawmakers have either died, defected, or have been expelled by their parties. An additional two seats will fall vacant when the Heritage Party sacks two of its MPs who accepted deputy ministerial positions in Mwanawasa's cabinet. The by-elections in North Western and Western Zambia are as a result of two UPND legislators being expelled from their party. They are standing on MMD tickets.