Zambia resumes vote counting after violence halts election process

Zambia's electoral commission hit pause on Friday afternoon, stepping back from the vote count that had begun rolling in the hours after polls closed on Thursday. The reason was stark: violence at polling stations had spiraled into something the commission could not ignore. Marked ballot papers had been stolen from ballot boxes. Polling staff had been attacked. The authority, facing a nationwide security crisis it could not yet contain, announced it was halting the entire counting process until the situation stabilized.

The election itself had been orderly enough. More than eight million registered voters turned out to choose a president, members of parliament, and local councillors. Queues formed early at polling stations. The day was largely peaceful, with only scattered procedural hiccups. But once the ballots began moving into tallying centres, something fractured. By Friday evening, after consultations with law enforcement, the electoral commission declared the security threat contained and counting resumed, with a deadline of Sunday night to announce results.

At the centre of the contest stood President Hakainde Hichilema, seeking a second five-year term, and Brian Mundubile, the main opposition challenger running under the banner of the National Reconciliation Party for Unity and Prosperity. Though fourteen candidates appeared on the presidential ballot, the race had crystallized into a two-person fight. Hichilema, 64, had won his seat in 2021 on his sixth attempt and had spent the intervening years navigating Zambia through economic turbulence—restructuring debt, steadying the currency, bringing inflation down. But prosperity had not reached everyone. Many Zambians felt their own circumstances had stalled or worsened, and Mundubile was banking on that frustration.

Mundubile himself was a former minister in the Patriotic Front government that ruled until 2021, and his campaign drew strength from supporters of the late former President Edgar Lungu, who died more than a year ago. His body remained unburied in South Africa, caught in a bitter dispute between Lungu's family and Hichilema that had deepened political divisions across the country. The election, in that sense, was not simply about economic policy. It was a referendum on competing visions of Zambia's recent past and its future.

On Friday, before counting resumed, Mundubile issued a statement expressing grave concern about the delays and what he called deeply troubling reports from multiple areas. He alleged military involvement at tallying centres. He raised questions about how ballot boxes had been moved. He demanded that results be published station by station, that the chain of custody be protected, and that investigations be launched into the reported incidents. He also claimed, based on his party's own tabulation, that he had won. Hichilema, for his part, issued a statement calling on Zambians to remain peaceful and patient as they awaited the official outcome.

The pause in counting had exposed something fragile about the process itself. Zambia has long held a reputation as one of Africa's more stable democracies, but that reputation has come under strain. Human rights groups, including Amnesty International, have raised concerns that political freedoms are being squeezed. The election was being watched closely as a test of whether that reputation could hold. Civil society monitors reported mostly orderly voting, though with some procedural issues. International observers were present.

On the ground, voters themselves reflected the country's divided mood. Mwiche Nalupumbwe, 26, had queued before dawn on Thursday morning. "Zambians are frustrated and this election is a 50-50," he said. "That is why we are all here early to make the change." James Phiri, a 29-year-old university student, voted for Hichilema, citing the reintroduction of meal allowances as evidence of progress. Samuel Chitendwe, a 47-year-old welder and father of four, voted for Mundubile. "I have just come from firing someone," he told a reporter. "We are tired of stories about economic progress."

The electoral commission had set itself a tight deadline: announce the results by the end of Sunday. If no candidate secured more than 50 percent of the vote, a runoff would be required within 37 days. The violence that had halted counting, the allegations of ballot theft, the competing claims of victory—all of it would have to be resolved, or at least managed, in the next 48 hours. What happened in that window would say something about whether Zambia's democratic institutions could hold under pressure.