Q1: The Kenya 2007 08 Civil Strife.

One of the great threats to any political systems, democracies included, is the desire on the part
of those who hold political power to maintain it, and to work their will free from the constraints
imposed by others ( Robert Erickson and Kent Tedin, 2001; P. 143). A gem of truth and wisdom
that must be inculcated in the hearts and minds of all African leaders (in government or from the
opposition) today. Co-existence becomes illusive when some refuse to adhere to or respect the
constraints necessary for this to take place as the Kenyan crisis of the year 2007-08 clearly
confirms.
This was a political, economic, and humanitarian crisis that erupted in Kenya after incumbent
President Mwai Kibaki was declared the winner of the presidential election held on December
27, 2007. Supporters of Kibaki's opponent, Raila Odinga of the Orange Democratic Movement,
alleged electoral manipulation. This was widely confirmed by international observers,
perpetrated by both parties in the election.
Early results, tallied from predominantly ODM strongholds, indicated that Odinga held a strong
lead on December 28, the day after the election, and the ODM declared victory for Odinga on
December however, as more results were announced on the same day, the gap between the two
candidates narrowed, and with almost 90% of the votes counted (180 out of 210 constituencies),
Odinga's lead shrank to only 38,000 votes. At a press conference on the morning of December
30, Odinga accused the government of fraud, urged Kibaki to concede defeat, and called for a
recount. He said that the ODM would not take the matter to the courts claiming that the courts
were controlled by Kibaki. The Electoral Commission declared Kibaki the winner on December
30, placing him ahead of Odinga by about 232,000 votes. According to Odinga, as many as
300,000 votes for Kibaki were falsely included in his total. The Chairman of the Electoral
Commission, Samuel Kivuitu, said that while irregularities affecting the entire exercise did
occur, they were a matter for the courts, not the Electoral Commission. Supporters of Kibaki,
meanwhile, said that discrepancies had actually worked in Odinga's favor, arguing that
discrepancies between polling station tallies and Electoral Commission results meant that Odinga
had gained 53,000 votes while Kibaki had lost 106,000. Following the Commission's declaration
of his victory, Kibaki was promptly sworn in for his second term late in the evening on the same
day.
Kivuitu said that there were some problems in the vote counting, noting that in one constituency
the reported turnout rate was 115%.According to the European Union's head observer in the
election, Alexander Graf Lambsdorff, the election was "flawed" and the Electoral Commission
failed to establish "the credibility of the tallying process to the satisfaction of all parties and
candidates"; he said that in some places EU observers were not allowed to see vote tallies until
the Electoral Commission announced them. The United Kingdom's Foreign Secretary, David
Miliband, said that his country had "real concerns" about the election. While the United States
initially congratulated Kibaki and called for the results to be respected, it also expressed concern,

and on January 2, 2008 a spokesman for the U.S. State Department declined to confirm U.S.
recognition of Kibaki's victory. Kivuitu said on January 2, that he had been pressured by PNU
and ODM-K (Kibaki's and Kalonzo Musyoka's parties) into announcing the results without
delay, and he claimed that he did not personally know who really won.
Within minutes of the Commission's declaration of Kibaki as victor, tribe-based rioting and
violence, primarily directed against Kikuyus, broke out across Kenya, and the government
suspended live television coverage for some days.Odinga alleged that "a clique of people around
Kibaki" sought to rig the election, but said that democracy "is unstoppable like the flow of the
Nile". The ODM announced its intention to hold a ceremony on December 31, in which Odinga
would be declared the "people's president", but police said that this could incite violence and that
Odinga could be arrested if the ceremony occurred. Odinga then delayed this, but called for a
million-strong rally on January 3, 2008 and for his supporters to wear black armbands as a show
of mourning.
Odinga said that the ODM would not negotiate with Kibaki unless he resigned, because to do so
would, according to Odinga, mean acknowledging Kibaki's legitimacy; he also said that, unless
stopped, the "ruling clique" could rig the next election in five years as well, and that he was not
afraid of being arrested, having been jailed many times in the past. For his part, Kibaki
emphasized the importance of peace, stability, and tolerance in his 2008 New Year's message,
speaking of the election as a concluded event and warning that law-breakers would be punished.
But the big question still remains, what really caused things to disintegrate so fast towards total
breakdown of law and order? This, I believe, was in part due to the ethnic and geographic
diversity of the Kenyan politics. As a matter of fact, no one narrative can explain the reaction of
opposition supporters to the announcement of Kibaki's swearing-in, which was done hurriedly
and at night. In addition to staging several nonviolent protests, opposition supporters went on a
violent rampage killing Kikuyus in several parts of the country after heeding a call from the loser
Raila Odinga to engage in mass protests which he announced on local television and radio
stations most noticeably in Mombasa, Eldoret, Kericho, Kisumu, Nakuru and parts of Nairobi.
Police shot hundreds of violent demonstrators, including a few in front of TV news cameras,
causing more violence.
Targeted ethnic violence escalated and at first was directed mainly against Kikuyu people the
community of which Kibaki is a member living outside their traditional settlement areas,
especially in the Rift Valley Province. This violence started with the murder of over 50 unarmed
Kikuyu women and children some as young as a month old, by locking them in church and
burning them alive in Kiambaa village near Eldoret, on New Years Day. Tensions in the Rift
Valley have caused violence in several previous Kenyan elections, most notably in the 1992
Kenyan Elections. This prompted the Kikuyu to start defending themselves which forced the
Luos and Kalenjins to stop the killings of the Kikuyus.

Former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan arrived in the country about a month after the election
and successfully brought the two sides to the negotiating table. On February 28, 2008, Kibaki
and Odinga signed a power-sharing agreement called the National Accord and Reconciliation
Act, which established the office of the Prime minister and created a coalition government. The
power-sharing Cabinet, headed by Odinga as Prime Minister, was eventually named on April 13,
after lengthy negotiations over its composition; it was sworn in on April 17.

Q 2 The Zambian Electoral Process

Steven Robbins and Nancy Langton (1999; P.449) submit that power refers to a capacity A has to
influence B so that B acts in accordance with As wishes. This definition constrains all leaders to
use their power as a means to attain not their own personal goals and aspirations, but those of the
group they are called upon to serve. And in Zambia, the group is referred to as the electorate.
Elections are a democratic means through which citizens exercise their right to elect leaders to
run affairs on their behalf. While elections alone are not a measure of democracy, peoples free
and active participation enhance the legitimacy of elected leaders and enhance democracy. In
Zambia elections to the councils, National Assembly, and the Presidency are held every five
years with the law providing for by elections within 90 days in the event of a vacancy arising in
any of the elected positions.
There is an agency, a dedicated wing of government commissioned with the task of managing
and monitoring elections in Zambia, introducing the ECZ. The Electoral Commission of Zambia
is an independent and autonomous Electoral Management Body (EMB) responsible for
spearheading, facilitating and supervising the electoral process of Zambia, in line with the
countrys electoral system. The primary goal of the Electoral Commission to deliver a credible
electoral process is achieved through:

The delimitation of constituency, ward and polling district boundaries;

The registration of eligible citizens as voters;
The conduct and the supervision of the countrys Presidential, National
Assembly(parliamentary) and Local Government elections;
The provision of electoral information and voter education to members of the public and
the electorate on the various phases/stages of the electoral process and elections, in
particular;
The establishment of alternative dispute resolution mechanisms for the management of
electoral disputes; and
The continuous review and update of electoral laws.

Zambia is a young democracy that has evolved over years to reach where it is at the moment. But
to fully understand the present, it is important to delve back into the past and gain some insight

about what has been and then from there then perhaps extrapolate into the future to gain some
foresight.
Zambia achieved independence from Britain in 1964 after a fairly non-violent struggle. Kenneth
Kaunda became the first President and served in that position until 1991. Although initially a
two-party state, Zambia officially became a one-party state in 1972. Periodic elections were more
or less formalities, as the United National Independence Party (UNIP) fielded all the candidates
and won all the elections without opposition.
Interestingly, churches and generally the civil society more or less accepted the one-party system
as an assurance of political stability and socio-economic development in a new nation state.
Multi-partyism was introduced in 1991, along with the wave of democratic reform across the
African continent. After serious civil unrest (prompted by IMF riots over increased food costs
and an attempted military coup), Kaunda agreed to a change in the constitution to allow for a
multi-party election. He fully expected to win and resisted some of the electoral reforms
demanded by the main opposition party, the newly formed Movement for Multi-Party
Democracy (MMD).
At this point, civil societies intervened and sponsored a meeting in the Anglican Cathedral of the
Holy Cross during which some compromises were reached between UNIP and MMD. This
cathedral meeting has sometimes been referred to as a type of constitutional conference and its
sponsorship earned the civil societies the title midwife of multi-partyism.
During the October 1991 elections, the main church mother bodies Zambia Episcopal
Conference (ZEC), Christian Council of Zambia (CCZ) and Evangelical Fellowship of Zambia
(EFZ) formed a monitoring team to promote free and fair elections. Through instructions in
churches and via media (e.g., television adverts), the churches urged for the peaceful elections of
officials who would truly serve the people.
In a statesman-like action, Kaunda accepted the results of an overwhelming defeat (winning only
25 percent of the popular vote) and gracefully stepped down. This made way for Frederick
Chiluba to be inaugurated as the second President of Zambia.
Democratic electoral processes suffered under Chiluba. Prior to the 1996 elections, Chiluba
manipulated constitutional reform to effectively bar Kaunda from seeking re-election. Yet as the
2001 elections approached, the MMD campaigned for a constitutional change in order to allow
Chiluba to run for a third term. This was Chilubas way of using his political engineering skills
to strike deadly blows at the very democracy that brought him into office. Someone climbs up
some rooftop using a ladder and then kicks it out so no one else should climb it.
Anyway, back to important aspects of history. When Chiluba started manipulating the LAW to
suit his own personal agendas, the three church mother bodies intervened, calling for the

protection of the constitution. The churches along with the Law Association of Zambia and the
Non-Government Organisation Coordinating Committee formed the Oasis Forum to campaign
against third-term presidential bids. With strong moral teaching from the churches, this campaign
succeeded and Chiluba was forced to vacate office at the end of his term.
Before leaving office, Chiluba imposed Levy Mwanawasa as the MMD candidate. A hotly
contested 2001 campaign saw Mwanawasa emerge as winner with only 28 percent of the popular
vote. The majority (72 percent) clearly wanted nothing more to do with the MMD government.
Nevertheless, Mwanawasa was sworn in as the third Zambian President since the constitution
provided for election by plurality of votes in which the winning candidate needed only to secure
the highest number of votes, not an absolute majority.
A court petition was filed by losing candidates, arguing that the elections were not free and fair.
The Supreme Court ruled three years later that there were problems on all sides, but not enough
to remove Mwanawasa from office.
As the 2006 elections approached, Mwanawasa resisted a constitutional change process which
would have assured significant electoral reforms (e.g., independence of Electoral Commission,
election by 50 percent plus one vote). Instead he called for minor changes through legislative
action. Major constitutional reforms were postponed until after the elections.
Mwanawasa won a second term, with approximately 43 percent of the vote. A populist candidate,
Michael Sata, won 29 percent of the vote and his Patriotic Front (PF) party swept the urban areas
of Lusaka and the Copperbelt. Hakainde Hichilema of the United Party for National
Development (UPND) received 20 percent. Sata demanded recounts and his party did gain some
new seats in parliament.
The electoral scene was radically altered when Mwanawasa suffered a stroke and died in
September 2008. Unclear constitutional succession procedures blurred the transition, but finally
Vice President Rupiah Banda assumed the role of Acting President and presidential by-elections
were called for at the end of October.
Strong civil society calls for free and fair elections were heard, but low turn-out ( only 45 percent
of those registered) brought a victory for Banda who defeated Sata by little more than 35,000
votes out of 1.8 million. The votes were Banda (41 percent), Sata (39 percent) and Hichilema (20
percent). Sata won significantly in the urban areas but did poorly in the countrys rural areas. He
again asked for court action for a recount but subsequently withdrew his petition. And now there
is an ongoing constitutional review process that should hopefully help Zambia concretely deal
with all or at least most of its electoral challenges and problems.
Zambia has continued to improve its electoral process since the return to multiparty system
partly as a result of the monitoring that has been done by election monitors who remained
vigilant throughout the process, highlighted irregularities where they occurred and made

recommendations on how best to improve the electoral process. Every election has exposed
shortcomings within our electoral process
Zambias Electoral problems and Challenges.

Biased mainstream media coverage of contesting candidates and their parties which has
in most cases led to unfair competition and thereby not abiding by the electoral code of
conduct when it comes to coverage.
Poor administration of the Public Order Act by the Zambia Police who have tended to
give a lot of leeway to the party in government while imposing restrictions on opposition
parties which has undermined democratic tenets.
Biased roles that are being played by some traditional leaders around the country who
tend to influence their subjects to support candidates of the traditional leaders choice.
This has led to continuous intimidation of voters in rural areas and also the breach of the
constitution.
Political and electoral violence which does not only leave voters with injuries including
death in some cases but also scares away voters from actively participating in the
electoral process.
There is general increase in the loss of confidence by voters in the electoral process as
most people still feel that elections are rigged in favor of the party in government. This
has led to voters thinking that their vote does not make a difference as elections are
predetermined.
Some polling stations are too far from voters which discourages them from going to vote
as they have to choose between providing for their families and voting.
The lack of integrity and poor performance by some of the elected leaders has also led to
some voters viewing elected leaders as selfish individuals who are only out to use voters
for their personal interest and gain.
Continued incidences of vote buying.

In conclusion, we can say that Clearly, a democracy will be more stable if citizens agree or are
in consensus, over basic values and goals (Robert Erikson & Kent Tedin, 2001; P.153). And in
order to address some of the challenges facing our electoral process, there is need to embark on
nationwide sensitization activities while also advocating for reforms of the laws that are
undemocratic and hinder citizens active participation. There is also great need of all key
stakeholders such as the Zambia Police Force, political parties, media and traditional leadership
to meet before every major election to find definite means and ways on how best to prevent
election related violence and corruption in order for citizens to freely participate in the process.

REFFERENCES

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Fullinwider K Robert (1999) Civil society, Democracy and Civic Renewal, New York:
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Hickey V Joseph, William E Thompson (2008) Society in Focus, New York: Pearson
Education Inc.
Keare John. (1998), Civil Society, Stanford- California: Stanford University Press
Moore Wayne (1996) Constitutional Rights, Chichester West Sussex U.K: University Press
Robbins P Steven & Langton Nancy (1999) Organizational Behavior Concepts, controversies
and applications , Scarborough - Ontario: Prentice Hall Canada Inc.