Zambia election marred by opposition arrests and vote count suspension

Eleven people, including six opposition figures, have been arrested in Zambia on allegations of militia activity, as the country awaits final results from a presidential election that has drawn sharp criticism from international observers. The arrests, which took place during a raid on Thursday night at the residence of the main opposition presidential candidate, have intensified an already volatile dispute over the integrity of the vote.

Armed raid on the opposition candidate's home

Zambia's government announced on Sunday that police had detained 11 individuals in an operation it described as a crackdown on militia activity. According to the government's statement, those seized were found carrying high-grade military weapons, ammunition and materials intended for armed insurrection.

The raid, however, did not take place at some clandestine safehouse. It was conducted at the home of Brian Mundubile, the presidential candidate of the National Reconciliation Party for Unity and Progress, or NRPUP, the country's principal opposition force. Mundubile's party said shots were fired during the operation. The candidate himself later described the episode as an attack on his life, claiming that heavily armed personnel descended on his residence after the election and that he was subsequently interrogated by army officers over videos he had published. He also alleged he was mistreated while in custody. Zambian authorities have denied those accusations.

Among those detained, according to Cabinet Secretary Patrick Kangwa, was Patrick Mwansa, the husband of Tasila Lungu, daughter of the late former president Edgar Lungu. That detail is not incidental. The current political turbulence in Zambia is inseparable from the legacy of Lungu's presidency and the strained relationship between his supporters and the current administration.

The government's defence

Mulambo Haimbe, Zambia's outgoing foreign minister, pushed back firmly against the opposition's account. He told DW that those apprehended had been charged and would stand trial, adding that it was not for Mundubile to make assertions about matters destined for a courtroom. Haimbe insisted that all actions taken by the authorities were designed to ensure the nation's security was not compromised during the electoral period.

The NRPUP, for its part, issued a categorical rejection of the government's claims, describing them as spurious and entirely false. The party denied any involvement in insurgency or militia activity by its leadership or members.

A six-hour halt to the count

The arrests did not occur in isolation. They came during an election whose counting process was itself interrupted. On Friday, the Electoral Commission of Zambia suspended the tally for approximately six hours after receiving reports of violence directed at polling staff and the alleged theft of ballot papers. The commission later said the security threat had been contained and resumed counting.

That suspension has become a central point of contention. Mundubile argued that the pause created opportunities for interference and manipulation of the results. The ruling United Party for National Development, or UPND, dismissed his argument, accusing him of trying to erode public confidence in the electoral process.

But the concerns extend well beyond Mundubile's party. Makebi Zulu, vice presidential candidate of the Tonse-Pamodzi Alliance, alleged a wider pattern: electoral officials implicated in irregularities, polling documents gone missing, security forces deployed to intimidate opposition figures. "A climate of fear cannot produce a free and fair election," Zulu warned.

The Catholic bishops intervene

Zambia's Conference of Catholic Bishops, an institution with considerable moral authority in a country where roughly a fifth of the population is Catholic, has stepped into the dispute with unusual directness. The bishops demanded that the Electoral Commission account fully and publicly for the chain of custody of every affected ballot box and ballot paper.

They also called for any military deployment to remain limited, transparent and temporary, and insisted that anyone held by state agencies must be promptly accounted for, granted access to legal counsel and family, and either charged in accordance with the law or released. Those are not demands a bishops' conference makes lightly. They reflect genuine alarm about the direction in which Zambia's electoral process is moving.

European observers describe a constrained democratic space

The European Union Election Observation Mission has added its voice to the criticism. Its chief observer, Michael McNamara, pointed to a series of structural problems: incumbency advantages that benefited the ruling party, heavily pro-government coverage in state media, late alterations to electoral legislation, disruptions to opposition rallies, and reports of intimidation directed at opposition candidates. The mission characterised the campaign as having taken place in a "constrained democratic space" with an uneven playing field that favoured the ruling party.

The Southern African Development Community, or SADC, expressed its own concerns, warning that the suspension of vote counting had generated uncertainty and anxiety among voters and political stakeholders. The combined weight of these assessments from both European and African monitoring bodies is difficult for the Zambian government to dismiss as foreign interference, not least because SADC is a regional body whose members include states with their own complicated democratic records.

The European Parliament's election observation missions have long been a tool through which the EU assesses whether partner countries meet the democratic standards that underpin trade and development agreements. Zambia's trajectory matters to Brussels: the country is one of the largest recipients of European development assistance in southern Africa, and the World Bank classifies it as lower-middle-income, with significant exposure to debt distress.

The shadow of the 2021 transfer of power

The current polarisation has deep roots. Hichilema took office in 2021 after defeating the incumbent Edgar Lungu, a transfer of power that was widely praised at the time as a democratic milestone in a region where ruling parties rarely lose. Since then, however, supporters of Lungu's Patriotic Front have accused the new government of pursuing politically motivated arrests and investigations against the former ruling circle.

The government's position is that it is merely enforcing accountability after years of corruption and abuse under the PF administration. The distinction between legitimate prosecution and political vendetta is rarely clean in any country, and Zambia is no exception. Lungu's death in South Africa last year has only intensified the dynamic: his followers have elevated him into a martyr figure, which complicates the government's efforts to frame its investigations as routine accountability.

For ordinary Zambians, the election has produced an uneasy mixture of hope and apprehension. Gracious Kaoma, a political science student at the University of Zambia, described herself as very hopeful yet concerned, noting that the process had been unusually long and challenging, and that the surrounding violence had been painful to watch. A Lusaka resident, Lydia Zulu, told reporters she was happy the elections had proceeded peacefully and well, and pleased that Hichilema appeared to be leading.

Where the count stands

Final results have not yet been declared. According to the Electoral Commission's own figures, based on 70 of 226 constituencies, Hichilema holds a lead of 626,434 votes to Mundubile's 505,795, a margin of just over 120,000. That is a substantial gap, but it is drawn from less than a third of all constituencies, and the remaining count may shift the picture. Urban constituencies, which tend to favour Hichilema, are often counted faster than rural ones, meaning early tallies can overstate an incumbent's advantage.

Mundubile has nonetheless claimed victory on the basis of his party's own parallel count, a move the Electoral Commission has rejected, insisting that only it has the authority to declare an official result. The question now is whether that result, when it arrives, will be accepted by the losers and by the population at large, or whether the allegations of irregularity, the arrests of opposition figures and the intervention of the bishops will leave a lasting stain on the process.