Lusaka, Monday (January 15, 2024)

_…As Brian Hapunda, the Media Director of the Socialist Party, demands an explanation on the reported secret recruitment of an additional 1,000 police officers from the announced 3,000_

SOCIALIST Party (SP) Media Director, Brian Hapunda has called on the Electoral Commission of Zambia (ECZ) to secure stakeholder consensus before introducing electronic voting in the 2026 presidential and general elections.

Mr Hapunda said it is surprising that the ECZ is insisting on introducing electronic voting without engaging stakeholders in a country where only 35 percent of citizens were technologically savvy.

He warned that ECZ should exercise caution before introducing electronic voting considering that 65 percent of the citizens who are not digitally savvy would be disenfranchised

“As Socialist Party, we can only view this as panic and maneuvers by ECZ to rig the 2026 elections through electronic voting. This is a plan simply by the ruling party to rig these elections taking advantage of the small number that are digitally savvy and this is unfortunate,” Mr Hapunda said.

He also demanded that the government through the Ministry of Home Affairs and Internal Security, should clarify reports on why it secretly recruited an additional 1,000 police officers on top of the announced 3,000 to police the 2026 elections.

“This is a scheme that they want to use to intimidate the citizens in 2026 as they rig the elections but this scheme will not work because the Zambians have already made up their minds on who to vote for in 2026 and they have already made up their minds that they are voting out the UPND.

“So, for this scheme to intimidate citizens through the police will not work and we wish to warn the UPND that they cannot overcome the power of organised citizens in numbers,” Mr Hapunda said.
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