“The outcome was never in doubt — the process is”: Antonio Mwanza gives the ECZ three questions, and a warning about 2031

It is not often that an opposition leader concedes the election and escalates the argument in the same breath. Antonio Mwanza, president of the Democratic Progressive Party, did both this week. "The outcome of the election was never in doubt," he said — President Hichilema, he believes, would always have crossed the 50-per-cent-plus-one threshold. His quarrel, he insists, is not with the winner but with the way the contest was run, and his demand lands on the Electoral Commission of Zambia's desk as three unanswered questions.

The first concerns the suspension of counting. During the general election the ECZ halted the counting and announcement of results, citing security grounds. Weeks later, Mwanza says, the public has never been told how widespread the concerns were, or what happened between the moment counting stopped and the moment it resumed. "The Electoral Commission of Zambia did not give us a detailed account of what happened between this period," he said. The second is Mandevu, where no result was declared after the commission said ballot papers and other electoral materials were stolen in the attack on the constituency's totalling centre — and where, weeks on, the public does not know whether anyone has been apprehended. The third is the death of a Socialist Party election agent, which, he says, neither the commission nor the Zambia Police has explained. "If we don't get to the bottom of this and to the extent of how widespread it was and to what extent it affected the outcome of the elections, we will have a repeat of this in 2031," he warned.

Mwanza was careful to separate the two questions his critics will try to fuse. He pointed to the Christian Churches Monitoring Group — whose members include the Jesuit Centre for Theological Reflection, the ZCCB, the CCZ and the Evangelical Fellowship of Zambia — and said he respected its finding that the President won. "There's no doubt about him winning the election. We're talking about the credibility of the process." It is a distinction the churches themselves were drawing the same week, and it is aimed at the argument the ruling party prefers, which is that every question about process is a complaint about the result.

His structural critique runs deeper than one commissioner's decisions. ECZ commissioners are appointed by a President who is also a candidate in the election the commission referees — an arrangement that, Mwanza argues, makes independence structurally impossible. "It is extremely difficult for the Electoral Commission of Zambia to act in an independent, impartial manner when they are appointed by a President who also happens to be part of the election process," he said. His party proposes that commissioners be selected by an independent and impartial body through a transparent process and ratified by Parliament. He also took aim at enforcement of the Electoral Code of Conduct: public media — ZNBC, ZANIS, the Times of Zambia and the Zambia Daily Mail, in his listing — leaned toward the ruling party in breach of the code's equal-coverage requirement, and the campaign timetable bound opposition candidates while the incumbent, exempt from it, campaigned at will. "The election must be free, must be fair, and everybody must be on an equal footing."

The DPP did not field candidates in August — registration, Mwanza says, consumed more than a year and left too little time, money and manpower — and is already organising for 2031, with electoral reform as its centrepiece. His demands now sit with a commission that has a fresh election of its own to run: Mandevu votes again on 5 November, along with Lumezi North, Mbala and eleven wards, under the eyes of every observer mission still in the country. The report Mwanza is asking for would be uncomfortable reading before that poll. Its absence may prove more uncomfortable still.

Sources: Lusaka Times, "Mwanza Demands ECZ Account For Suspended Vote Count And Stolen Mandevu Ballots" (1 Oct 2026); News Diggers, "ECZ sets Nov 5 for Lumezi, Mandevu parliamentary elections" (26 Sep 2026); 5FM Radio on the ECZ's August statements and the ZCLU challenge (Aug 2026); Lusaka Brief reporting on the 5 November by-elections (30 Sep 2026).