A Day After Fresh Mandevu Order, ZCLU Questions ECZ’s Legal Authority

LUSAKA: A day after the Electoral Commission of Zambia ordered a fresh parliamentary election in Mandevu constituency, the decision is facing a direct legal challenge, with a civil rights group insisting the Commission had no lawful basis to call the rerun. ECZ announced on…

LUSAKA: A day after the Electoral Commission of Zambia ordered a fresh parliamentary election in Mandevu constituency, the decision is facing a direct legal challenge, with a civil rights group insisting the Commission had no lawful basis to call the rerun.

ECZ announced on Saturday that it would conduct a fresh poll in Mandevu following a security breach at the constituency’s totalling centre on August 13. Unknown individuals attacked the centre, destroyed result transmission kits and fled with documentation, preventing declaration of results in the seat.

The Zambian Civil Liberties Union has now questioned the legal authority behind that decision. Executive director Isaac Mwanza said there is no law that mandates the Commission to cancel and conduct fresh parliamentary elections outright.

ZCLU said it had examined the Electoral Process Act of 2016, as amended in 2025 and 2026, particularly Sections 56 and 75, and found that neither provision applies to a cancellation or a fresh call for nominations of this kind. “The two sections cannot both apply,” Mwanza said, since the Mandevu incident occurred after voting and during aggregation. He argued the only proper course open to ECZ was to approach the Constitutional Court for guidance on whether a by-election could be held at all, given that no law empowers it to order one unilaterally.

Candidate reaction has hardened in the day since Saturday’s announcement. Citizens First’s Steven Mwale argued the fresh poll would impose a heavy financial and logistical burden on candidates who had already invested heavily in their campaigns, saying the commission should instead have pursued those responsible for the alleged ballot tampering rather than ordering a complete rerun.

Independent candidate Adrian Banda said he remained too disturbed to comment further, while Resolute Party’s Jean Kapata has still not spoken to journalists on the matter.

Socialist Party’s Teddy Mwaba maintained his welcome of the decision a day on, describing it as a step toward restoring fairness following irregularities in the original vote, and repeated his call for ECZ to release a full election timetable without delay.

Green Party leader Peter Sinkamba, who warned on Saturday that the disputed August 13 poll could be reduced to an academic exercise unless the manipulation that marred the process is addressed, has since gone further. He is now challenging ECZ to consider fresh mayoral elections in Lusaka alongside the Mandevu rerun, given how much the mayoral vote draws from Mandevu.

ECZ now faces a choice: defend its authority to order the rerun as announced, or clarify whether it intends to seek the Constitutional Court’s guidance that Mwanza says the law actually requires. Ten parliamentary candidates remain on standby for the reignited Mandevu seat once, or if, nomination and polling dates are confirmed.