Makebi’s Victory: A Question of Legitimacy
By Dr Mwelwa
The announcement that Makebi Zulu has emerged victorious in a Patriotic Front convention should, in ordinary circumstances, represent closure. Instead, it opens a deeper legal and political puzzle that goes to the heart of legitimacy, process, and authority.
The first question is simple but unavoidable: was this a PF convention in the legal sense, or merely a political gathering conducted under urgency? The PF Constitution anticipates a broad-based delegate conference, often projected into thousands. Yet reports suggest participation was below four hundred. In law, numbers are not cosmetic—they go to the validity of representation. Can such a process claim to reflect the will of the party?
Secondly, there remains the unresolved issue of injunctions. Where a court order restrains party activity, any subsequent meeting held in defiance of that order becomes legally vulnerable. Even if politically convenient, such actions risk being declared null. The question therefore is not who won, but whether the contest itself can survive judicial scrutiny.
Thirdly, the Registrar of Societies becomes central. In Zambian party law, leadership is not confirmed by applause but by registration. Until the Registrar updates records in line with lawful processes, any declared presidency remains politically asserted but legally uncertain. This creates a dangerous duality—power claimed in public, but unrecognized in law.
Then there is the shadow of the pending consent judgment. If the court enforces the agreement restoring PF to its pre-October 2023 leadership structure, the entire foundation of this convention could be retrospectively invalidated. In legal terms, it would be treated as though it never existed.
This leads to a more uncomfortable question: is Makebi Zulu now President of PF, or President of a process that may not legally stand? Leadership derived from a disputed forum carries a burden—it must first prove its own legitimacy before it can claim authority over others.
Politically, the implications are equally serious. A rushed convention, held under legal uncertainty and with limited participation, risks deepening rather than resolving division. Those excluded or unconvinced will not simply disappear; they will contest the outcome, either politically or through the courts.
In that sense, what appears as victory may be a temporary consolidation rather than a definitive settlement. PF’s crisis has never been about the absence of leaders—it has been about the absence of a universally accepted process.
Zambia’s political history offers a clear lesson: parties are not destroyed by losing elections alone. They are weakened when their internal legitimacy collapses, when rules are bent for expediency, and when leadership is declared without consensus.
Makebi Zulu may have won a vote. But the more difficult question remains unanswered—did he win the party?
Until that question is resolved in both law and politics, PF remains not a united organization, but a contested space.
And in contested spaces, titles are announced quickly—but legitimacy arrives slowly, if at all.