🇿🇲 DATELINE | Opposition in Flux: 48 Hours That Rewired the Battlefield
The last 48 hours have produced one of the most destabilising sequences in Zambia’s opposition politics since the Patriotic Front’s 2021 defeat. Court rulings, rival congresses, surprise endorsements, and open accusations have collided, leaving voters, party structures, and even sitting MPs struggling to keep up.
What follows is a clear reconstruction of how events unfolded and why they matter.
The chain reaction began yesterday with a High Court decision freezing the Patriotic Front’s planned General Conference. The ruling restrained the Given Lubinda-led faction from convening, adopting candidates, or holding meetings in the party’s name pending a full trial.
The impact was immediate. With the election clock already ticking, the ruling paralysed the party’s internal succession plans. No conference meant no clear authority to issue adoption papers, no confirmed leadership, and no legal clarity on who speaks for the party.
For many PF MPs, this created a vacuum. The vacuum did not last long.
Within hours of the court freeze, a rival centre of power emerged. A faction of the Tonse Alliance, led by Dan Pule, convened a General Conference and elected Mporokoso MP Brian Mundubile as Alliance President.
The move was seismic.
For Mundubile’s supporters, it offered a tactical escape from PF’s legal paralysis. For the Lubinda bloc, it was an act of political desertion carried out under the Tonse banner. PF leadership dismissed the gathering as an illegal breakaway and accused Mundubile of using an alliance structure to bypass party processes.
PF National Chairperson Jean Kapata was blunt. By participating in the Tonse conference, Mundubile had, in the party’s view, “effectively expelled himself.”
The anger within PF is not only procedural. It is emotional and strategic.
Senior figures point to the January Chawama parliamentary by-election, where victory was secured using the Forum for Democracy and Development as a special-purpose vehicle. The campaign was heavily powered by PF mobilisation, funding, and senior leadership, including Given Lubinda, Miles Sampa, and Chishimba Kambwili.
Mundubile, Dan Pule, and former State House aide Chris Zumani Zimba were notably absent from that campaign.
Now, with Mundubile elected Tonse Alliance President, PF leaders fear he is effectively taking over the same FDD vehicle they helped deliver to victory just weeks ago. To them, it looks less like alliance politics and more like a hostile takeover.
As PF was still absorbing the Tonse shock, another surprise landed.
The New Congress Party, which had recently signalled a return to the Lubinda-aligned Tonse camp, unveiled Makebi Zulu as its presidential candidate. Party president Peter Chanda stepped aside, urging members to rally behind Zulu.
The implications are sharp. Unlike Tonse, NCP is a registered political party. It holds a parliamentary seat in Eastern Province, also won with PF backing. By backing Zulu, NCP has effectively opted out of the Mundubile moment, reinforcing fears among PF old guards that allies are benefiting from PF support only to chart independent presidential paths.
One fact underpins the confusion. The Tonse Alliance is not a political party. It has no independent legal personality to adopt candidates or issue nomination papers. Every strategic move must ultimately anchor itself in a registered party vehicle.
Right now, those vehicles are pulling in different directions.
PF is frozen by court order. FDD appears to be drifting toward Mundubile. NCP has planted its flag behind Makebi Zulu.
What remains of PF’s authority is now a question not of rhetoric, but of law.
All this is unfolding as voting closes in the Kasama mayoral by-election, a symbolic PF stronghold where opposition fragmentation is playing out in real time. With Parliament dissolving in May and campaigns formally opening, the cost of confusion is rising fast.
Zambia’s electoral law is unforgiving to parties without clear leadership, legal standing, and recognised adoption structures.
For voters, the last 24 hours have stripped away slogans and exposed the machinery of opposition politics. What remains is a stark question:
Who actually controls the tools required to contest power?
© The People’s Brief | Francine Lilu
Those MPs in all the numerous PF functions who still want to salvage their careers must look beyond PF for now and seek refuge in other establishments, because the ruling party has succeeded in discombobulating PF. Heed Kambwili’s saying that those who compete with the elephant when pooping end up tearing their anus. PF is gone seek other avenues.