Opposition gains heart from MMD losses

The loss of three straight by-elections by President Frederick Chiluba’s Movement for Multiparty Democracy (MMD) should be cause for concern for the ruling party in the run-up to general elections possibly later this year, political analysts told IRIN this week. The MMD was still licking its wounds after being defeated in a July by-election in Lusaka’s Chawama constituency, when it last week lost its Kabwata seat in Lusaka and the Isoka East constituency in Northern Province near the Tanzanian border. Kabwata went to the Forum for Development and Democracy (FDD), a party that was formed only in April by renegade MMD members opposed to Chiluba’s alleged bid to run for an unconstitutional third term. Isoka was won by the former ruling party, the United National Independence Party (UNIP), which many observers thought was no longer a credible political threat. Chawama was scooped dramatically in July by the United Party for National Development (UPND), led by former Anglo America chief executive Anderson Mazoka. The MMD officially has a whopping 132 out of 150 elected parliamentary seats. Following the expulsion from the party of 20 FDD MPs, that figure should be down to 112 seats, but a court injunction makes the dissident MPs still MMD members on paper. However, according to Fred Mutesa, a political analyst at the University of Zambia’s Department of Development Studies, there has been a perceptible erosion of support for a party that has ruled Zambia since 1991. That, he added, is likely to have a significant impact on presidential and parliamentary elections due to be run before March 2002. “In simple words, people have rejected the MMD,” Mutesa alleged. “And, also, if you can’t carry an important seat in the capital, your chances of being effective in the presidential polls are highly questionable.” According to Mutesa, the slip in the MMD’s electoral fortunes are largely a result of the split in the party which saw some of its most effective founding members, including former vice-president General Christon Tembo and labour minister Edith Nawakwi, resigning to form the FDD. “The FDD and the MMD are very much alike,” Mutesa said. “They have the same campaign tactics and they have the same background so what is happening is that the MMD is fighting itself, except that the FDD has steam right now having just broken off.” Ngande Mwanajiti of the human rights group Inter-African Network for Human Rights and Development (Afronet), told IRIN: “Despite all the resources the MMD had at their disposal they lost all the same. This is because when they came to power in 1991, people voted on the basis that they [MMD) would be transparent, corruption-free and accountable, but all that has been a pipe dream. To me, this is the reason they have been losing in the past and may continue losing.” The weekend before the bi-election, Chiluba, who constitutionally cannot run as the MMD candidate in the presidential polls, visited Kabwata and offered residents over 5,000 government houses for sale at heavily discounted prices. Election monitors said the action was tantamount to vote buying. However, Chiluba said he was just helping empower the community under the Presidential Housing Initiative, a scheme he initiated a few years ago. “Once you start losing the influential and elite vote in the capital, just know that things are not going your way,” said Mwanajiti, who is also chairman of a consortium of NGOs set up to monitor the general elections. However, Zambia’s opposition parties are notoriously divided. There has been talk of mergers, but they are yet to agree on a single presidential candidate. In contrast, after the political hiatus earlier this year over Chiluba’s alleged intention to amend the constitution to allow him to run for a third term, he stepped aside last month in favour of Levy Mwanawasa, the MMD’s new standard bearer.