ECZ SHOULD USE CHAWAMA BY-ELECTION MONEY TO EXTEND VOTER REGISTRATION – KBF
ZAMBIA Must Prosper President Kelvin Fube Bwalya says the Electoral Commission of Zambia should use the money earmarked for the now vacant Chawama seat to extend the voter registration exercise.
On Saturday, the mass registration of voters came to a conclusion, with the ECZ stating that the process, which was twice extended, would not see another extension.
Meanwhile, Bwalya claims that the Northern part of the country recorded lower numbers of new registrations because it was disadvantaged.
The latest ECZ update as of November 26 shows that Copperbelt, Southern and Lusaka Provinces recorded the highest new registrations, with 231,883, 218,966 and 200,367 respectively. Meanwhile, Muchinga (61,069), Northern (89,007) and North Western (101,033) recorded the lowest.
Commenting on that in an interview, Bwalya, who is also a Tonse Alliance member, was of the view that the exercise should have gone on until the end of the year.
“First of all, it is unfortunate that ECZ is talking the way it’s talking. Our appeal has always been to keep the voter registration and voter verification open. Perhaps even up to the end of the year, this year. Voter registration is one of the pillars of our democracy. People have to choose leaders who they want. And the numbers must be enough to demonstrate [that] the demography has been represented. When you give a period of registration or verification of voter registration, it does not necessarily mean that everyone is going to find the time to fit into your programme, simply because you are government or you’re ECZ,” he said.
“As a government and as ECZ, give enough notice and enough time for people to fit into their schedule. What I found on the ground was that there were pockets of people that were registering and verifying their voters’ cards and making sure that they are on the voters’ roll. There is genuine interest from Zambians, especially the first-time voters, who would like to be part of our registers as citizens. Voting is a duty of every citizen, and it must not be taken lightly. This is what our forefathers fought for, to give us the right to vote and be able to elect our own leaders. When we deny people that, simply because we are rushing, [it is wrong]. In our view, as Zambia Must Prosper, we find that unfortunate and terribly wrong”.
Bwalya said the money that could be wasted in Chawama should be channelled towards the extension of the voter registration exercise.
“The Speaker of the National Assembly is very quick to deny Tasila Lungu [from] representing the people of Chawama by declaring the Chawama seat vacant. That means, technically, if she doesn’t get an injunction, we’re going for a by-election. That money being wasted there can be used in the extension of voter registration. That is more important to me than a by-election in Chawama. Honourable Tasila Lungu has not been absent or an absentee Member of Parliament deliberately. Her father died, for God’s sake. Let us be morally right as a nation. I don’t know what is wrong with Nelly Mutti. And as a lawyer, she must understand. Most of all, she’s a woman, this is what we expect of a mother,” Bwalya said.
“Tasila is not making decisions by herself, the family is involved. So whatever the family decides, she has to obey. She doesn’t want to be declared a truant child who has put politics above the burial of her father. Traditionally, that would be a curse on her part. So why wouldn’t the Speaker of the National Assembly, for instance, understand that? And why wouldn’t Mwangala Zaloumis on the other side understand that there are more people willing to register at their own time and extend the period? We don’t need to take the registration of voters lightly, or the verification of voters lightly. Neither should we take the declaration of the seat of a member of parliament lightly, especially when we’ve got very few months before the dissolution of Parliament”.
Further, Bwalya said UPND’s wasting of resources suffocates him, adding that such decisions annoy citizens.
“Why are we going to be wasting government resources in this manner? I mean, this UPND government suffocates me in its thinking sometimes. But they’re just annoying the Zambians. Because that’s taxpayers’ money. It is not Nelly Mutti’s money. It is not Mwangala Zaloumis’ money, it is taxpayers’ money. So let them put the taxpayers’ money where it really matters, not in nonsense. Nobody wants a by-election in Chawama. And nobody wants to cancel the registration of voters and the voter verification. So the whole thing in terms of decisions, for me, is dangerously wrong. This kind of thinking… This government is worrying,” he added.
Meanwhile, Bwalya claimed the low number of registrations in the northern block was as a result of a deliberate policy of the UPND government to have voter registration continuously going on in the Southern Province and part of Western Province while having excuses for the northern block.
“It is not about Northern Province not wanting to participate. I think our chiefs are on record. Even in the Eastern Province, our chiefs are on record. It has been a deliberate policy of this Hakainde Hichilema government to have voter registration continuously going on in the Southern Province and part of Western Province. Because they think that’s their bedroom. That’s their bedrock. So they have been continuously registering voters on the Southern side. We know that for a fact. In the Northern Circuit, it has been excuse after excuse. In the Northern circuit, our information on the ground from our chiefs, officials and others on the ground, including their own officials in the ECZ who have been talking to us, [is that] it’s always ‘this machine has broken down’,” Bwalya said.
He said the other reason was the time of the exercise, adding that the process should have started as early as August before the onset of the rains in the Northern circuit.
“The other point that we got from most of our church leaders [and] traditional leaders is that this thing has come at the wrong time. Right now, it’s heavy rains in the northern circuits. Rains there come quite early. So when people are going out in the village to go and start their farming, you don’t expect them to travel back to go and start doing voter registration. The timing is wrong completely. People leave the villages and they go to their fields. Because their fields are not in the villages. They keep their farming blocks away from the villages. So they go there and they camp there. So when the people from the registration office or ECZ come in the towns or districts, they are out of the villages. This is another problem which the government should have noticed,” said Bwalya.
“So the voter registration should have started around August, September, October, before the onset of the rains. Because with the rains, everybody is thinking, what are we going to eat next year? I mean, you know how bad the economy is. So people are worried about school kids, how are they going to have their fees to be paid and things like that. They should stop lying about this free education. People still need to transport their kids, they still need to buy uniforms. There’s a whole lot of mumbo-jumbo for a parent. So these are the problems that the UPND doesn’t think of. Voter registration, in our view, as Zambia Must Prosper, must be an ongoing exercise. Just like they did in the Southern Province”.
News Diggers
KBF: That means, technically, if she doesn’t get an injunction, we’re going for a by-election. That money being wasted there can be used in the extension of voter registration. That is more important to me than a by-election in Chawama.
COMMENT: It is clear here that KBF acknowledges that by-elections are a drain on the national treasury. Bill 7 which he is opposed to seeks to address this problem. PF would have simply replaced her with another PF preferred person from Chawama and avoid a by-election and a potential loss of the seat by the party.
KBF: Honourable Tasila Lungu has not been absent or an absentee Member of Parliament deliberately.
COMMENT: Loss of a seat is not always deliberate. It is sometimes lack of compliance with laid down procedures. She was initially given compationate leave. At the end of that, she disregarded regulation as a law maker and went on without official leave. That is where she broke the protocol. The law had to be followed just like the case was for JJ Banda.