Maravi

ECZ’s complicity with MMD

ECZ’s complicity with MMD
By The Post
Sun 27 Mar. 2011, 04:00 CAT

IT is clear that the Electoral Commission of Zambia seriously lacks independence from those in control of government and the ruling MMD. We say this because the Electoral Commission of Zambia has demonstrated inability and unwillingness to take a position that is different from that of Rupiah Banda.

The Electoral Commission of Zambia has shamefully continued to parrot the MMD propaganda line that parallel vote tabulation will lead to chaos in the forthcoming general elections.

They know that this position is wrong, but they are not prepared to take a common sense position because they seem to fear being on the opposite side of Rupiah.

This is what makes our people very concerned about our electoral system.

If the people who are supposed to administer the elections are not capable of stating the obvious because doing so may upset one of the interested parties, in this case those in government, then what confidence should our people have in them?

They know as well as anybody else does that it is not parallel vote tabulation that will cause electoral chaos in our country.

If anything, its absence is what may cause our people to fail to accept the accuracy of results and therefore be tempted to take matters into their own hands.

We should never delude ourselves that because we have enjoyed peace all these years, our people are incapable of defending what they think is their right.

We say this because we believe that there is a lot of frustration amongst our people about the state of our electoral system.

This same Electoral Commission that is today claiming that no one else should add up the results which they declare, no one should verify the results that they are tallying and compare them with what was actually released at the polling station by themselves, has in the past produced and declared inaccurate or wrong results.

There are many examples that one could give.

But probably the most embarrassing is the one involving MMD’s Emmanuel Munaile in Malole.

Everybody knows he lost the election but he was wrongly declared winner by this same Electoral Commission. Today, this gentleman is still a member of parliament, serving a full term, on a wrongly declared result.

The Electoral Commission’s insistence that parallel vote tabulation is wrong raises very serious questions about their ability to conduct a free and fair election.

What is it that they intend to do with the results that makes it wrong for any other person to add up results that have already been put in the public domain by themselves?

Maybe we are missing something. What is the parallel vote tabulation that they are concerned about? We ask this question because the parallel vote tabulation that is being proposed is nothing new and is not something outside their control.

During the last election in 2008, there was a website that many of our people accessed which was adding up results that had been declared by the Electoral Commission at various polling stations.

As has been said before, members of the MMD actually told the public that they expected to win on account of the results that they had tallied. No one was arrested. Why is it wrong today?

Without beating about the bush, the Electoral Commission is behaving as though they intend to rig this year’s election.

That is the only explanation one can give for the nonsensical position that they have taken.

We say nonsensical because even the Law Association of Zambia has now told them that contrary to their paymaster’s wishes, parallel vote tabulation is not illegal nor is it criminal in this country.

The Law Association has gone on to state that in fact, it is a legitimate election monitoring methodology.

For our part, we have told them that parallel vote tabulation has been done in this country. We even referred them to a book published on the 1991 elections.

The Carter Center and the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs has published a book entitled The October 31, 1991 National Elections in Zambia.

This book records how parallel vote tabulation was used in that election. When did it become illegal and inimical to the political stability of this country?

Anyone listening to the Electoral Commission knows that they are being dishonest. It is this that worries us. It is this that is likely to cause chaos if they do not stop this nonsense.

We know that there is great interaction between senior officers of the Electoral Commission and Rupiah’s election schemers such as Vernon Mwaanga.

What do they talk about? This probably explains why today they are speaking the same language on parallel vote tabulation. This is not a recipe for managing this year’s elections well. It is a recipe for discord in the nation.

As we stated before, our Electoral Commission is far from being independent. This says nothing about the quality of individuals that man it.

We have a lot to say about that but that is not the point because even if one took an objective analysis of its constitution, this Electoral Commission is incapable of being independent.

It is designed to give those in power an undue advantage over their political opponents.

We say this because the choice of people that serve as commissioners, for instance, reflects the wishes of the government of the day.

There is no room for other political players, including independent organisations such as the Law Association of Zambia, to play a meaningful role in ensuring that the Electoral Commission conducts free and fair elections.

Other countries have adopted a model which allows the party in government and the opposition to be represented to ensure that everybody gets the comfort that the Electoral Commission is operating freely.

The whole electoral process is run by agents of the ruling party.

As we have stated before, a greater part of the electoral process is managed by the Ministry of Local Government and the Ministry of Home Affairs.

And if past experience is anything to go by, the ruling party uses these government officers who they have strategically appointed for this purpose as their electoral agents.

In other words, the electoral process in Zambia is heavily skewed against the interests of the general public. The process is designed to serve the wishes of the government of the day.

There is something fundamentally wrong with the way we run our elections.

But this is not the whole story. To this should be added the inefficiency, ineffectiveness and disorderliness that characterise the operations of the Electoral Commission of Zambia.

It is this that threatens the peace and stability of our country, not parallel vote tabulation.

If anything, parallel vote tabulation has the potential of helping the Electoral Commission of Zambia to validate their work and minimise their errors.

If they have no hidden agenda, they would be the first ones to embrace parallel vote tabulation because it is a valuable aid in their work which they are supposed to be doing on our behalf.

Why should they stop people owning a process that belongs to them?

We continue to say that once the Electoral Commission declares the results obtained at a polling station, their work is over.

The rest is clerical and ceremonial. Why should this be such a bone of contention?

Lest they say nobody told them, we wish to put ourselves on record that the route the Electoral Commission seems to have chosen on this matter will land this country in a lot of chaos.

Our people have been restrained before, including by ourselves, when they have felt that results have not been properly handled.

Let us not tempt them. What is happening in North Africa today is a result of people feeling that their governments have usurped their rights and made it impossible for them to express themselves meaningfully through the ballot box on the way they are governed.

The arguments being used by the Electoral Commission to oppose parallel vote tabulation are shallow and meaningless. It is clear that even they are not convinced by them.

We call on the Electoral Commission to reflect very carefully on this matter and help our country to avoid being thrown into an abyss of electoral conflict.

We continue to call upon justice Ireen Mambilima, the chairperson of the Electoral Commission of Zambia, to exercise courageous, principled and honest leadership on this matter for the sake of our country.

This nonsense has to stop.

Labels: CADRES, ECZ, MMD

posted by MrK @ 4:37 AM