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Andrew England Correspondent
“Everybody sees an opportunity to be president . . . everybody smells power,”
POLITICAL uncertainty and factionalism are blighting Zambia, Africa’s second-largest copper producer, with both the ruling party and the main opposition threatened by splits ahead of elections next month.
Zambia hosts some of the largest mining groups, including Glencore, First Quantum, Barrick Gold and Vedanta Resources, which are already grappling with sliding copper prices and policy uncertainty.
Lingering tensions in the governing Patriotic Front, which has been in power since 2011, erupted shortly after the death in October of Michael Sata, the populist president nicknamed “King Cobra”.
Sata was the PF’s founder and dominant figure, and he did not groom a successor.
In his absence, a fight broke out over who should lead the party into January’s presidential elections, a battle that deepened this week when rival PF factions announced two candidates. A similar situation has plagued the Movement for Multi Party Democracy (MMD), one of the main opposition groupings, with two rivals also claiming to be its legitimate presidential candidate.
“It is very confusing . . . there is a kind of rupture. I would call it an implosion,” says Neo Simutanyi, director at the Lusaka-based Centre for Policy Dialogue. “It is clear that in the PF there are two factions that are irreconcilable.”
Before he died, Sata’s government announced plans to increase royalties from 6 percent to 8 percent in underground mines, and to 20 percent in opencast operations, but the mining groups have warned the proposals could threaten future investment. At the same time, Zambia’s copper-dependent economy has struggled, with the currency, the kwacha, among Africa’s worst performers in 2014.
This is in part due to the decline in copper prices, but also because of what investors have seen as excessive public spending that is to blame for a widening in the fiscal deficit.
As the kwacha slid, Sata’s government was in June forced to request the help of the International Monetary Fund.
A team from the IMF arrived in Lusaka Friday to begin a two-week visit. The delegation was meant to visit last month, but that was postponed following Sata’s death.
Mr Simutanyi believes the political chaos caused by ruptures in the two main parties will further damage confidence. “We need a leader who will ensure the economy is well managed — that will reassure the market. There is anxiety now as to what is going to happen,” he says.
The fractures in the PF began soon after Guy Scott, Sata’s deputy, took over as acting president. Mr Scott, the first white person to lead a country on the African mainland for 20 years, is constitutionally barred from contesting the presidency because his parents were born outside the country.
But the PF is split between the “Guy Scott camp” and those who are loyal to Edgar Lungu, the defence minister who was made acting president by Sata the week before his final trip to London, where he died in hospital.
Mr Lungu was chosen as presidential candidate by his supporters on Sunday, while the rival faction elected Miles Sampa, deputy commerce minister, the following day. Each group accuses the other of acting illegitimately. The High Court ruled on Wednesday that Mr Lungu was the duly elected PF candidate, but it is unclear if the ruling will pacify tensions in the party.
A similar situation has blighted the MMD, with both Rupiah Banda, Sata’s predecessor as Zambia’s president, and Nevers Mumba, the party’s president, claiming the nomination.
“Everybody sees an opportunity to be president . . . everybody smells power,” Mr Mumba told the Financial Times.
The chaos in the two largest groupings could benefit a third party, the United Party for National Development, led by Hakainde Hichilema. Dipak Patel, the UPND’s campaign manager, said: “There is total disarray among the other political parties, and their record of economic management is disastrous. We are pretty confident.”
Parties have to formally submit nominations for the presidency to the country’s chief justice between December 17-19, a deadline that should give some clarity on who will stand under what banner.
It is a process Zambians and foreign investors will be watching anxiously.
“People are worried because the actors in this drama, especially the PF, are powerful players. You are talking about the acting president . . . and the minister of defence,” Mr Simutanyi says.
“It has implications for the security of the country because it could divide society.” — The Post.
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