Marvin Chanda Mberi, Regional Correspondent
LUSAKA – The Zambia Center for Interparty Dialogue (ZCID), the church and other stakeholders have come up with the initiative of bringing political parties on the round table and sign the peace accord.
The initiative is said to be an undertaking by political parties especially candidates to ensure that they conduct their political activities in a peaceful manner ahead of August general elections.
Peace accords are not new to Zambia and have been signed before only for them to be relegated to a mere paper that has no effect with the recent one being in March, 2019.
The peace charter, on 24th March, 2019, between two main political parties namely; the Patriotic Front (PF) and the United Party for National Development (UPND) was envisaged to brink a new order in the nation on the political side.
The two entities back then represented by their respective Secretary Generals, in the presence of then Deputy Inspector General of police Bonny Kapeso, signed the peace accord to end political violence.
The agreement was published in the state run media houses by Electoral Commission of Zambia (ECZ) and endorsed by then Home Affairs Minister Honorable Stephen Kampyongo.
This was the gravity of the agreement which had among other things; undertaking by political parties to coexist and demilitarize their respective youth wings.
Since then President Edgar Lungu has openly denounced violence and from time to time called on police to fully enforce the law but the call has not been enough.
The argument has been that since there is no binding agreement of the accord, no mechanisms for enforcement or consequences can therefore arise from non-adherence to the accord.
Violence has been taking place and it has been business as usual with the recent one being the opposition orchestrated bloodbath, where the UPND militants chased after the PF supporters along Kasangula Road in Mandevu constituency.
Political Parties 2019 Zambia Peace Accord
The political parties had the opportunity to abide by the moral duty to respect their own agreement through the March, 2019 Peace Accord.
However, with elections campaigns already in full swing there is a sense of belief that the new Electoral Code of conduct which candidates swore to observe if respected to the later, peaceful polls are guaranteed.
Moreover, unlike the hurriedly drafted previous peace accord which impose a mere moral obligation, the Electoral Code is legally binding and enforceable with punitive measures on those who violate it.
In the new code, both the church mother bodies and other proponents of the peace accord do not have the legal mandate to enforce the code.
According to analysts, it is only logical for political parties to parade themselves as proponents of peace by signing the binding electoral code.
It is expected that various political parties, especially their candidates will honour the electoral code and ensure peaceful polls this year.
