Introduction

As what has been dubbed by some observers “the second liberation” of Africa has been  under way since the second half of the 1980s. Zambia is among the pioneering states to undergo a democratic transition. The country’s transition to multi-party democracy was widely acclaimed to be a model for other African countries to emulate.[1] A broad-based movement of intellectuals, trade unionists, professionals, and religious organizations, among others,  managed to sweep away from power the United National Independence Party (UNIP), which had ruled the country since independence in 1964, and its leader, Kenneth Kaunda. The peaceful transition was completed with the holding of multi-party elections in October 1991. It is generally recognized that the mere occurrence of a democratic transition does not in itself guarantee the sustenance of the democratization process. The question, then, is: what has been the direction of the democratization process since the transition? 

            This paper is an attempt to assess the progress of democracy and good governance in Zambia in the post-transition period. Granted that the transition was successful, we proceed from the premise that the basic problematic to be addressed is that of democratic consolidation. After defining basic concepts, the paper covers the following subject areas: multi-partyism; civil society; the state of human rights; fundamental freedoms; democratization and economic reforms; and the electoral process. 

Definition of Basic Concepts
Democracy and Democratic Transition and Consolidation: 

The term democracy is used in diverse ways in political literature. Different writers tend to emphasize divergent aspects. The basic element in many definitions is that it is a form or system of government. This is then followed by enumeration of its definitive features. This paper is concerned  with liberal democracy. And our working definition of this will be that it is a type of political regime under which individual rights and freedoms are guaranteed and political leaders are subject to periodic elections by, and are accountable to, the people.[2] 

            Democratic transition is conceptualized as the interval between an undemocratic system of government or regime and a democracy. It is understood not only in terms of time and space but in terms of political activity and transformation as well. It is during the transition that the old undemocratic regime crumbles and on its ruins gets erected a new democratic system. It is generally accepted that this period tends to be characterized by contest between reformers seeking to establish the new system and conservatives seeking to maintain the status quo. Similarly it is acknowledged that completion of a democratic transition does not in itself guarantee sustenance of democracy. For this to happen certain conditions must be met to ensure the consolidation of democracy. Democratic Consolidation has been defined as: 

“the process by which democracy becomes so profoundly legitimate among its citizens that it is very unlikely to break down. It involves behavioral and institutional changes that normalize democratic politics and narrow its uncertainty.” [3] 

Good Governance: 

Good governance is yet another catch phrase that has gained currency, thanks to the donor fraternity. It has been defined as: “exercise of political power to manage a nation’s affairs”.[4] It refers to “clean”, efficient, responsible and accountable government. Kisa lists the following elements of good governance: political accountability (ensured through election); freedom of association and participation; a sound judicial system; bureaucratic accountability; freedom of information and expression; and competent public agencies.[5] 

Multi-Partyism in Zambia 

In a multi-party liberal setting, it is through political parties that citizens are offered choice between alternative political leadership and policies, and also afforded an opportunity to compete for power. For multi-party democracy to work well, strong competitive parties are required and the competition itself must be fair. The party system in Zambia is generally weak. The de jure one-party system has simply been replaced by a one-party dominant regime. The result of the popular struggles that led to the fall of the one-party state was to give a landslide electoral victory to the MMD which led the forces of change. The MMD again scored a landslide victory in the controversial legislative and presidential polls of 1996. However results indicated that support for the MMD had weakened in Southern, Western, North-Western and Central provinces, compared to its electoral performance in 1991.[6]  Opposition parties generally have very narrow bases of support. They are anchored in specific parts of the country and tend to be ethnically/regionally based. During the 1991 elections, the former ruling party, which is also the strongest opposition party, was basically reduced  to a regional party, with its main anchor in the Eastern Province  where it won all the 19 parliamentary seats. It won only six additional seats from other provinces making its total tally 25, compared to the MMD’s 125. In 1996, out of more than 35 registered political parties, only 12 fielded candidates for the parliamentary election and only 4 contested the presidential polls. Nine boycotted (including UNIP). The ruling party won 130 out of 150 parliamentary seats, plus the presidency. An unprecedented 10 independent candidates also won. The remaining 10 seats were shared among opposition parties. The president has the power to nominate an additional 10 members of parliament, and as a matter of course he picks members of his own party. Except for about seven, most opposition parties are too weak on their own to offer a strong challenge to the ruling party, let alone winning parliamentary seats.[7] And efforts to form alliances among them have not been very successful. Fragmentation of the opposition has worked in favor of the ruling party. Parties also have very unequal resource bases. With the exception of the ruling party and a few opposition parties, most parties have inadequate resources. The ruling party has the additional advantage of access to public resources, particularly during elections. The president is allocated funds to spend as he pleases, and this has been dubbed by his opponents as “slush funds”. In 1998, these amounted to K12bn. During elections he goes round the country making donations to various causes out of this fund. In the 1996, election year, the president launched a scheme to sell council houses to seating tenants at give away prices. In some cases, all tenants had to pay were legal fees for transfer of ownership. Again in December 1998, at the same time that he announced the date for local government elections, he also announced the resumption of the sale of government houses to tenants. Likewise, relief food distribution is carefully timed and targeted so as to gain electoral capital. The electoral system is another factor affecting the balance of power among political parties. Because of the fragmented nature of the opposition, the plurality electoral system, used in conjunction with single member constituencies, has tended to work in favor of the ruling party. Thus Lusaka Central Independent Member of Parliament, Dipak Patel, has argued that although it is fragmented, if a system of proportional representation was used, the opposition would be able to get enough seats in the legislature to offer a credible challenge to the ruling party.  Perceiving that the MMD would not accept PR, he called on the opposition to unite. The current party system, he argued, did not augur well for democracy, for ‘democracy does not proceed through a series of intermittent landslides in which the “old order” is swept away and a “new order” gets to govern as arrogantly and selfishly as it likes until it too is consigned to oblivion’.[8] 

            Opposition parties have also been subjected to state intimidation. Each of the two times the state of emergency has been declared, leaders of opposition parties have been among those people who were detained by authorities. A state of emergency had been in existence since 1964 until it lapsed after the October 1991 multi-party elections. The MMD government has declared the state of emergency twice. The first emergency was declared in March 1993, ostensibly to deal with the threat to national security posed by the so-called Zero Option Plan allegedly conceived by UNIP to overthrow the government unlawfully. The second emergency was declared in October 1997 following an attempted coup. This time UNIP leader and former president Kaunda and Zambia Democratic Congress (Party) leader and former cabinet Minister in the MMD government, Dean Mung’omba were among the detainees. One MMD official, Princess Nakatindi was also detained. Rodger Chongwe, leader of the Liberal Democratic Front (Party), a former cabinet minister in the MMD government, and chairman of the Patriotic Alliance comprising of several opposition parties was forced to flee the country and go into exile. In between the two emergencies, top UNIP leaders, including the party’s vice-president Inyambo Yeta,  were remanded in custody for nine months after being charged with treason in connection with a spate of amateurish bombings, and this was in an election year (1996). They were all acquitted by the courts due to lack of evidence. Before the 1996 legislative and presidential elections, the MMD-dominated parliament passed amendments to the constitution which disqualified UNIP president Kaunda and the party’s vice-president Yeta. The amendments were widely condemned by UNIP itself and a large number of civic organizations. UNIP subsequently boycotted the elections. 

            Inter-party and intra-party politics are generally characterized  by intolerance. Within political parties, members with dissenting views and those who have been perceived to harbor ambitions of challenging current leaders have been subjected to expulsion. This suggests that appropriate behavioral changes befitting a democracy have not yet taken root. When it comes to choosing candidates for parliamentary elections, the tendency for top party organs is to impose candidates on local constituents. In the 1996 elections, this led to a number of locally popular candidates defying their parties and standing and winning as independent candidates, for which they were expelled from their parties. The option of standing as independents is not available to presidential hopefuls as it is not permitted by the constitution. All efforts to resolve differences over key issues, such as amendments to the constitution, the electoral process, the Public Order Act, and equal access to government-owned mass media, through dialogue between opposition parties and the ruling party have so far yielded no tangible results. 

Civil Society 

Civil society has been defined as the “private sphere of material, cultural and political activities resisting the incursions of the state”.[9] Most writers agree that civil society performs functions that are essential for consolidation. These include the following: promotion and expansion of participation by citizens, recruitment and training of leaders, and cultivation and nurturing of democratic culture. Other than functions performed by civil society, strong political institutions are also generally considered to be essential for consolidation of democracy. However, by their nature, civil society organizations while performing the important function of challenging the state, stop short of seeking to gain control of the state. In other words, they do not generally compete for political power with the ruling elite 

            Under the one-party state various types of organizations did exist and did challenge the state on various issues from time to time.[10] However, the space for their activity was severely constrained by the state which made efforts to Copt some of them. In essence, therefore, they were more or less merely tolerated so long as they were not perceived to pose very serious danger to the survival of those in power. The trade union movement was probably the most powerful and best organized among them. Others were mainly professional and church organizations. 

            In the wake of the transition to multi-party democracy, the number of civic and other associations and the range of their activities increased. Election monitoring groups made their debut in this period. These organizations gave birth to and worked closely with the MMD. However in the post transition period, particularly in the period leading to, and after,  the 1996 elections, the relationship between them and the latter has soured over issues of democracy and human rights. Following their declaration of the elections as not being free and fair, the offices of the Zambia Independent Monitoring Team (ZIMT), the Foundation for Democratic Process (FODEP), and the Committee for Clean Campaign (CCC) were subjected to searches by the police which seized documents. Their bank accounts were also frozen and leaders were questioned by the police.[11] The government sometimes accuses pro-democracy NGOs of being fronts of the opposition parties and agents of foreign powers. The latter charge is an allusion to these groups’ heavy reliance on foreign donor funds. For example, On December 2, 1996, President Chiluba accused some NGOs of having hidden national agendas adding that there was need to know where their money came from. He revealed that the government would introduce legislation to regulate NGO activity.[12] 

            The position of the labor movement in society has changed considerably since the transition. Its power has been undermined by the effects of the implementation of the structural adjustment programmes (SAPs) and by the liberalization of trade union activity itself. SAPs have resulted in high job losses in the short term and the effect of this has been to reduce the membership of the labor movement as well as its income from membership subscriptions. From the point of view of rank and file members, the legitimacy of the unions has also been undermined. Instead of fighting for better conditions of service, union leaders have found themselves busy negotiating for redundancy packages. As far back as the one-party state, the Zambia Congress of Trade Unions advocated pro-market economic reforms.[13] After the transition it generally supported the MMD’s economic policies. However, under pressure from rank and file members, it has increasingly been distancing itself from the government. An indication of this is the Zambia Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) elections held in October 1998. The incumbent president of the union, perceived to be supported by the republican president, only narrowly defeated his rival in the contest for the presidency, Austin Liato (erstwhile vice-president), perceived to be opposed by the republican president. Delegates walked out after the results were announced.[14] Much as it is in line with the principles of democracy, liberalization of the trade union activity has contributed to fragmentation of the labor movement, thereby weakening its bargaining power. Under the one-party state, the government imposed a policy of one industry one union. This policy was abandoned at the same time that it decided to yield to demands for multi-party democracy. At that time the ZCTU leadership opposed the move, seeing it as an attempt by the UNIP government to weaken it as a punishment for the leading role it had played in fighting for democracy. However, the MMD government implemented the same policy by passing The Industrial and Labor Relations Act of 1993. Furthermore, under the provisions of the law it is extremely difficult for unions to go on legal strikes as they have to exhaust cumbersome procedures first and strike action must be taken after a majority of members vote in support in the presence of a government official from the Ministry of Labor and Social Security. Sometimes government officials fail to show up when they are requested to. The weakening of the labor movement on the economic front does not necessarily mean that it does not have potential to exert political leverage. On the contrary, over time, if the harsh effects of SAPs remain unmitigated, organized labor is likely to increasingly become politically restless and confront the state more fiercely in the political arena. Hence, from the point of view of the government, a pliant or “friendly” labor movement may be viewed as desirable for the successful implementation of the structural adjustment programme.[15] 

The State of Human Rights 

Respect for human rights by the governors is widely recognized as an important component of “good governance.” Yet African governments generally have poor track records on this score. As far as Zambia is concerned, in spite of the fact that the country has a number of institutions designed to protect the rights of citizens, the government’s human rights record has not been a very exemplary one either. Various rights associated with liberal-democratic regimes are protected by the bill of rights in the republican constitution. The bill of rights has been incorporated in all constitutions since independence and has not changed much. Since the advent of the Third Republic, the bill can only be amended upon approval in a popular referendum. Recommendations by the Mwanakatwe Constitutional Commission appointed in 1993 to have it altered to incorporate new elements, including social and economic rights, the right to bail, and freedom of the press, were rejected by the government.[16]. Freedom of the press is covered under freedom of expression.[17] A basic weakness of the bill is that it contains too many derogations.[18] And when a state of emergency is in force some of the rights guaranteed therein are suspended.[19] In addition, it is generally too expensive for most people to seek redress from the courts when their rights are violated. This notwithstanding, the bill has served a good purpose, even during the transition itself. Enforcement has been the main problem, particularly in cases involving violations by the state itself. 

            Early in its first term, the government took a positive step by appointing an ad hoc human rights commission (The Munyama Commission) to probe human rights abuses in the country and make appropriate recommendations.[20] After the commission completed its work the government appeared reluctant to publish the report and only did so after it was leaked to the press.[21] 

            The commission concluded, among other things, that violations of human rights had taken place in the Second Republic (one-party state) and continued in the Third Republic itself. For detainees the violations included: 

  (a) lengthy interrogation and physical and mental torture perpetrated by joint teams of police    officers,  military intelligence and state security personnel;

 (b) incommunicado detention;

            (c) denial of food, rest, sleep or medical attention; and

            (d) denial of access of family, friends and lawyers.[22] 

The commission also observed that: 

            For the Police Service it recommended the establishment of a statutory Independent Police Complaints Authority and Internal Investigations Department to deal with complaints against the police. 

            The Commission also reported that the Zambia Security Intelligence Service had been involved in the interrogation and torture of political detainees and coup plotters. It pointed out that the service was in effect exercising police powers when the law did not give it such powers. Accordingly, the commission recommended that facilities and resources of the Intelligence Service should not be used for incommunicado detentions of people, interrogation and torture. It also recommended that the service should not exercise police powers.[24] Contrary to the above recommendation, when parliament subsequently amended the Zambia  Security Intelligence  Service Act, extensive police powers were included.[25] 

            The commission also found that immigration authorities often violated the rights of illegal immigrants and asylum seekers some of whom were remanded in prisons and literally forgotten contrary to the law and international conventions.[26] Under the prison services it saw evidence of poor sanitary conditions, poor food and clothing, and above all, overcrowding. All the prisons were built before independence and could not accommodate the increased inmate population. The commission observed that prisons had three to four times the number of inmates they were designed for and that, contrary to the law, various categories of convicts, remandees and detainees were mixed up in the same cells. 

            For the most part, the recommendations of the commission have just been ignored by the government. Meanwhile, the violations it highlighted have basically continued. Torture and other forms of inhuman treatment of detainees and suspected criminals have continued. This is in contravention of Article 15 of the constitution which states that: “No person shall be subjected to torture, or to inhuman or degrading punishment or other like treatment.” Police have also tended to use excessive force and gunned down suspected criminals contrary to the law which provides that a person is innocent until proven otherwise and that suspects have to be accorded fair trial. In October 1998, police gunned down eight persons, some of them apparently in cold blood, and left no one to stand trial in connection with the murder of former finance minister Ronald Penza.[27] In cases like these, it is only occasionally that erring officers are brought to book and charged with murder. The subsequent appointment in March 1997 of a permanent Human Rights Commission under Part XII of the constitution has not yet made any significant impact. The Commission is basically perceived to be “toothless”.[28] 

            The above observations raise serious questions about governance. It is evident that police and security officers who have been violating the rights of citizens have been acting contrary to the law, suggesting that the rule of law is not adequately followed. It also suggests that civilian rulers are not strongly committed to respecting human rights or else they should have exercised the necessary control over the affected arms of the state.  In May 1998, the government informed the World Bank Consultative group meeting in Paris that it would investigate complaints of torture made by those detained in connection with the October 1998 coup attempt.[29] The Human Rights Commission has also submitted a report on the matter to the government. It remains to be seen what the government will do about the case. 

Fundamental Freedoms 

Here we shall cover mainly two areas: press freedom, and freedom of assembly and association. These freedoms are protected by the constitution under Articles 20 (freedom of expression, including freedom of the press) and Article 21 (freedom of assembly and association). As pointed out earlier, the rights and freedoms protected under the bill of rights are subject to numerous derogations. However one needs to look at the extent to which these freedoms and rights are actually enjoyed. 

Press Freedom 

The onset of the transition to multi-party democracy witnessed the inauguration of a number of privately owned newspapers in addition to the state-owned ones that had dominated the print media field. These tended to counterbalance the state-owned counterparts. However, the state continued, and still continues, to monopolize electronic media, that is, radio and television. There are only three privately owned radio stations. And two of these are owned by religious organizations (Radio Christian Voice and Radio Icengelo). There is only one privately owned religious television station and this belongs to the US - based Trinity Broadcasting Corporation.  The state has been slow in granting licenses for radio and television stations. 

            Journalists of privately owned newspapers and media organizations often complain about the restrictive legal framework within which they operate. A study undertaken early after the transition revealed that there were 27 laws which the government could use to muzzle the press.[30] Criminal libel and criminal defamation have been the most frequently invoked laws against journalists, mostly from the independent press. Instead of living up to its pledge to repeal laws restrictive of press freedom, the government was trying to add more restrictive laws. In 1995 parliament enacted the Parliamentary and Ministerial Code of Conduct Act which, among other things, provided for journalists to be compelled to reveal sources of their information.[31]  In 1997, it attempted to add a law to establish a Media Council to regulate  the activities of journalists and media organizations (including licensing). This was bitterly opposed by both private and public media organizations and individuals. The government was forced to withdraw it.[32] 

Freedom of Assembly and Association 

The laws governing the registration of political and voluntary organizations, including political parties, trade unions,  professional organizations and civic associations are generally not restrictive. Most of these organizations are registered under the Societies Act. The procedure for registration is a fairly simple one. Basically, what is required is to submit the constitution, names of office bearers, and police clearance, among other things. Once registered, an association has to submit annual returns to the registrar of societies. 

            The problem has been with freedom of assembly, including the holding of processions, when these are done by opposition parties or any other voluntary associations protesting against the government. The main obstacle in this regard has been the Public Order Act under which, before the 1995 amendment, police permits were required. Police tended to deny permits to opposition groups. Sometimes permits would be given and then withdrawn at the last minute. Meetings or processions held without police permits were illegal and subject to being broken up by force, while organizers as well as their followers were liable to prosecution. However, the law exempted government leaders from obtaining permits. Besides, police tended to take no action against those holding pro-government meetings and processions. 

            In a 1995 landmark decision, the Supreme Court ruled that the requirement of police permits for assembly contravened the constitution and was therefore illegal.[33] When the Act was amended, the permit requirement was replaced by a requirement for organizers of meetings and processions to give fourteen days written notice to the police and to provide marshals, among other things, who would cooperate with the police to ensure peace. Meetings and processions may not be held if the police determine that they would not be able to maintain peace them.[34] Hence de facto restriction of meetings has remained as before. And many organizers of meetings just refer to the notice as “permit”. Repeal of this law is one of the demands that opposition parties and pro-democracy NGOs continue to demand. 

Democratization and Economic Reforms
Overview 

The realities of the Zambian situation are such that democratization has to be undertaken simultaneously with the structural adjustment programmes (SAPs) and both are conditions for aid. At each of the periodic consultative meetings, the country’s performance vis a vis political and economic benchmarks is reviewed. Political conditionality has been defined as “the imposition by aid-giving states on recipient states of requirements relating to the domestic political structure of the recipient state as a condition for the allocation of aid”.[35] The genesis of the current political conditionalities of democracy and good governance is well documented in available literature.[36] We shall not go in historical detail. Suffice it to say that Western donors, as a general rule, have clearly driven the message home that their money will go to those countries that pursue democracy and good governance and respect for human rights. Political conditionalitites have in essence become the other side of the structural adjustment programmes coin. 

            The thinking behind political conditionality is that, from the point of view of donors, it is a sine qua non of economic development. It is believed that structural adjustment stands to alter the economic structures that have benefited ruling elites and spread benefits to the population at large. Hence ruling elites cannot be relied upon to enthusiastically implement economic reform from which they stand to lose.[37] Similarly, it is believed that the poor showing of SAPs in Africa is attributable to corrupt, dishonest, and inefficient political leadership as well as lack of popular participation. The last position downplays the effects of unfavourable conditions that the world economy imposes on African economies, such as unfavourable terms of trade, and market barriers. The above positions also assume that structural adjustment programmes are compatible with democratization. 

            Viewed from the perspective of social justice, a somewhat different picture emerges. While there is a tendency to look at democracy in purely political terms, some scholars extend the horizon to include social, economic and cultural rights. Thus Edmond Keller conceives democracy as involving “the guarantee of social justice, government accountability and human freedoms”,  and democratization as, among other things, “the development of more egalitarian social relations and the elimination of autocratic structures”.[38] Whatever perspective of democracy they embrace, a number of scholars share the view that even where a democratic transition takes place, in the long run consolidation is likely to fail under conditions of poverty and social injustice.[39]

Zambia’s Track Record 

Following the successful transition, the new government enjoyed goodwill from donors and funds were quickly secured. But the “honeymoon” passed rather quickly. The declaration of  the state of emergency in 1993 and detention of a number UNIP leaders and claims of betrayal of ideals of democracy by a splinter group within the MMD itself made donors begin to doubt the MMD government’s commitment to democracy. Differences over the adoption of the new constitution and the electoral process in the run up to the 1996 elections finally made a number of donors cut off balance of payments support. Since then they have insisted that aid would resume after the issues are resolved through dialogue between the MMD and other “stakeholders”. Democracy and governance are firmly placed on the agenda of the country’s donors. For example, in November 1997 while presenting his credentials, the new Danish ambassador to Zambia, Sandau-Jensen informed President Chiluba that Denmark would continue to support the country if it did not violate democratic principles.[40] Similarly, in October 1998 the German ambassador indicated that Germany would release US $18m grant for 1998 economic cooperation pledged the previous August if the government met donor conditions of “transparency, good governance and improves its human rights record”.[41] The government’s line of defence is that of “rule of law”, its argument being that without it, there would be no rights to enjoy.[42] as Ndulo has observed, the term appears to be used with the import of “technical compliance to any law without regard to the law’s legitimacy and the bad faith basis of any action taken by the state.”[43] Opposition parties and civic organizations (local and international), for their part, usually lobby donors to use their influence and sanctions to ensure that the government adheres to democratic norms of government.[44] 

            On the economic front, the MMD government reached agreement with the IMF and the World Bank in 1992 for a comprehensive structural adjustment programme. The conditions included:           

(a)  Raising interest rates;

            (b)  Removing foreign currency exchange controls:

            (c)  Abolition of public agricultural marketing boards;

            (d)  Privatization of state-owned enterprises;

            (e)  Removal of trade barriers; and

(f) Withdrawal of subsidies on social services.[45] 

Although the government has pursued the structural adjustment programmes faithfully, tangible results in terms of a turnaround of the economy are yet to be seen. Unemployment resulting from restructuring has been very high. The incidence of poverty too has been high.[46] Manufacturing and agriculture are the sectors that have seen considerable disruptions.[47] 

The Electoral Process 

Under the current approach to democracy in Africa, elections and multi-partyism, have assumed such importance that it is as if democracy itself can be reduced to mere holding of elections and multi-party systems. Appearances can be misleading and one needs to be careful to ascertain that in their operation electoral processes and multi-party systems conform to acceptable democratic standards. Since the run up to the 1996 legislative and presidential elections, the electoral process has been a major bone of contention between opposition parties and civil society organizations. The Independent Electoral Commission, appointed just a few days before the nomination day was, and still is, not considered to be sufficiently independent. First and foremost, its members are appointed by the President, who is also a member of a political party and cannot therefore be relied upon not to be partisan. Opposition parties and other stakeholders are not represented on the commission. With regard to the finances, the commission does not have sufficient autonomy either. Although it has the authority to secure funds from any source, it has to have the permission of the president. In any case, the government itself is likely to be the major source of the commission’s funds. The law gives the commission power to conduct elections and to supervise and control the registration of voters. The Mwanakatwe Constitutional Review Commission had recommended that the commission have power, among other things, to compile and maintain registers of voters.[48] The significance of the language here is that opposition parties were critical of the government’s decision to contract a private company, NIKUV of Israel, to compile registers and they took the matter to court. The court ruled that the law as it stood, did not preclude the involvement of other organizations in the registration process. Another major problem with the commission has been inefficiency. Thus during the 1996 elections, numerous anomalies were found in designation of polling stations, in voters’ registers, in voting procedures, and in the handling of election results themselves.[49] Better training, and provision of adequate human and financial resources are likely to lead to improved efficiency. 

            Electoral rules are another problem area. Some of the rules introduced in 1996 are considered by opposition groups and civic associations to be discriminatory and designed to bias the electoral system in favor of the ruling party. This applies particularly to a new clause in the constitution requiring that to qualify as a presidential candidate, a person’s parents must be Zambians by birth or descent.[50] However, this clause cannot stand in its present form in view of the ruling by the Supreme Court on the presidential election petition that the description ‘Zambians by birth or decent’ cannot apply to the period before independence.[51]  Likewise, the clause prohibiting chiefs from seeking election to the presidency or the national assembly has been challenged, and so has been the amendment to the electoral act providing that presidential election petitions can only be lodged after elections have taken place, even where what is being challenged are the qualifications of a candidate to stand.[52] Because of the manipulation of rules by the government and the imposition of constitutional amendments on the people, in the face of opposition from civic organizations and opposition parties, among other things, monitoring groups declared the 1996 elections not free and fair. 

            Concerning malpractices, the law as it stands has reasonable provisions for dealing with and punishing perpetrators of malpractices. However enforcement is weak and there are still some loopholes that need sealing. For example, malpractices not committed by the candidate himself or herself are only punishable if they are committed with the sanction of the candidate. Also, it takes a long time for courts to dispose of election petitions. Laws also need to be amended to oblige the government to hold elections on time, specifically, before the term of office of the elected officials expires. For example, the local government elections to be held this month (December, 1998)  were supposed to have been held three years ago. But the law allows the government to defer them, and it was this loophole that was exploited. The law must also be strengthened to oblige the electoral commission to publish provisional and final election results within a specific time frame. So far the commission has been producing ‘provisional results’ only. 

Concluding Remarks 

In this paper an attempt has been made to assess the progress of democracy and good governance in Zambia in the post-transition period. The basic approach was to gauge the extent to which conditions conducive to consolidation of democracy exist and to examine the direction of the democratization process itself. From the analysis done it is clear that the government is not very committed to democratic reform. It appears to be involved in a balancing act involving undertaking democratic reforms incrementally and under pressure from opposition parties, civic organizations, and donors, among others, on one hand, while ensuring that it does not lose power as a result of such reforms. This explains failure to undertake far reaching measures to arrive at a genuinely democratic constitution and truly fair electoral system. It also explains attempts to control civic organizations and the press and the harassment of potentially strong opposition parties and leaders. The democracy that the government can tolerate is what has been termed “minimalist democracy”.[53] This attitude of the governors has largely contributed to the country’s poor human rights record. 

            While a vibrant civil society exists and is able to join forces with international pro-democracy organizations and donors, the party system is weak and the opposition does not pose a serious challenge to the governors. The weak party system combined with widespread poverty resulting from a prolonged economic crisis pose serious challenges to the consolidation of democracy.   Under such conditions, authoritarianism may increasingly take root as the governors try to suppress public disenchantment. Civic organizations and the press are also likely to be viewed as enemies of the state. Past experience has shown that the state can simply ignore local civic organization’s calls to democratize and even harass them if it is not perceived to be in the interest of the governors. In short the survival of democracy and its consolidation will largely depend on the balance of power among the pro-democracy forces and the state. Under current conditions it seems that the best that can be hoped for is “minimalist democracy”. 

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