By Mthoniswa Banda –

The 2015 elections that saw Zambians elect Edgar Chagwa Lungu as the country’s 6th president and by default retained the Patriotic Front as the ruling party in Zambia till the 2016 presidential and parliamentary elections, will go down in history as one of the strange times when Zambian political parties threw caution and decorum to the wing and aligned themselves with the highest bidder.
Eleven parties joined the fray and cast their lot in the hope that one of them would emerge victorious and be the new party to lead Zambia into the 2016 elections.
Top among these political parties and in the order they performed were the Patriotic Front (PF) led by Edgar Lungu, United Party for National Development (UPND) led by Hakainde Hichilema, Forum for Democracy and Development (FDD) led by Edith Nawakwi, the Movement for Multiparty Democracy (MMD) led by Nevers Mumba and the United National Independence Party (UNIP) led by Tilyenji Kaunda.
Others were the Fourth Revolution (4R) led by Eric
Chanda, National Restoration Party (NAREP) led by Elias Chipimo, Heritage Party (HP) led by Godfrey Miyanda,
Christian Democratic Party (CDP) led by Dan Pule, Forum for Democratic Alternative (FDA) led by Ludwig Sondashi and the Green Party led by Peter Sinkamba.
These were political parties that felt they were strong enough to face the voter and clear enough to explain their manifestos and plan vision before the Zambian people.
The 2015 presidential elections was as a result of the death of a sitting president and as the constitution stipulated, article 38 (1) of the Constitution of Zambia states that;
‘If the office of the President becomes vacant by reason of his death…, an election to the office of the President shall be held in accordance with Article 34 within ninety days from the date of the office becoming vacant,’ so the country needed to elect a new leader within 90 days of this occurrence.
In every game however, there are spoilers and chancers. In politics there are filibusters! Zambia is fortunate to have both!
The spoilers and filibusters in Zambian politics are the political parties that are always on the political scene giving all sorts of ludicrous statements and yet when the time to file-in their nominations comes they are nowhere to be seen.
In the case of the just ended elections, these were the political parties that were loud enough in political rallies and press briefs but were not on the ballot box.
They were the political one man/woman party (also known as political NGOs) that made public endorsements for another political party and extolled the better qualities of its leader.
They urged the Zambian voters to vote for the extolled leader and gave reasons why that leader was better than all the leaders of the political parties (including them)!
Theses spoilers did all the campaigning either as part of the endorsed party or under the patronage of the favored party. Their leaders did so either because of the future benefits their actions would get them or because they were paid to endorse the other parties.
Examples of political parties that were active during the run up to the January 20, 2015 elections but were never on the ballot box  for one reason or the other included Alliance for Democracy and Development (ADD) led by Charles Milupi, Alliance for Better Zambia (ABZ) led by Frank Bwalya and National Revolutionary Party (NRP) led by Cosmo Mumba. Mike Mulongoti of the People’s Party and Nason Msoni of All People’s Congress (APC) were reported to have endorsed UPND and a few days later rescinded their decisions to support the PF.
Explaining himself, Vernon Mwaanga said of his endorsement, “The tragedy of some of our opposition political party leaders is that they have their verbal energies targeted at wrong targets, thereby weakening the civilised ways of participating in politics. Given the state of our country is in, I had to look for what is best for Zambia at this time,” Mr Mwaanga said in a statement to the media.
On the other hand Mike Mulongoti said during a press briefing when he and his party withdrew support for UPND to endorse the PF “Our criteria as an alliance is that we are desirous of a presidential candidate who can demonstrate competence experience, honesty, genuine inclusiveness and maturity in the manner and style of campaigning. Whilst we encourage and embrace electoral pacts and alliances, these should be genuinely driven and based on a mutually agreed upon programme to save our people opposed to rallying around individuals and personalities.”
Frank Bwalya claimed his party had not spread (to all parts of the country) for him to lead it through a presidential election and thus resolved to rally behind Lungu.
“It is our considered view that if the PF adopt Edgar Lungu the PF stands a greater chance of winning the January, 20 elections. As independent observers we have noticed that his popularity has been growing across the country. We can safely say that Zambians have decided to vote for Edgar Lungu to finish the term of Mr Sata.” Fr Bwalya said
Now that the elections have come and gone and we now have a 6th president in the name of Edgar Lungu, who has appointed his full cabinet, we can safely wait and see if the reasons given for these endorsements still hold water.
However these elections brought to light the now acceptable norm by small one man or woman political parties (political NGOs) to disturb or confuse the voters from making the right choice.
The role of political parties is to offer themselves as alternatives to the ruling party (or government in waiting) by participating in all elections called.
These small parties are also fond of stirring trouble for the opponents of their preferred candidates, distracting them from discussing real issues of the campaigns.
In terms of media space, these small political NGOs tend to also overcrowd the media space by giving out interviews to gullible media houses like free manner and also occupying whatever little political media campaign space was available.
Looking at the outcome of the last January 20 election, there is no evidence that these political NGOs or one man parties added value to the political campaigns of this country and whether their endorsements have helped in any way the winning team to win.
Take UPND for example, they got endorsements from bigwigs of the MMD governing body the NEC led by its national chairperson Kabinga Pande, the ADD and prominent citizens like Vernon Mwaanga and Maureen Mwanawasa but still lost the elections.
The country must then start to identify these political spoilers or filibusters and start to ensure that these are not entertained in anyway during a serious undertaking such as choosing the next leader.
For good governance organisations and embassies that sponsor political parties they need to raise the bar as to who they support and include participation in national, parliamentary and ward elections as a condition for their support and in the event that they provide financial resources, there is need for these organisations to always ensure that resources that have not been used during the election are returned to these donors.
There is also need for the  Electoral Commission of Zambia to restrict the campaign media space to only candidates from political parties that have successfully filed in their nominations so that these are given ample time to engage with the registered voters and citizens.
For media gate keepers (editors and senior reporters) there is need to start ignoring these political NGOs (one man parties) during the campaign period so that there is enough space reserved for competing and serious political parties only.
(The author is the Panos Institute Southern Africa (PSAf) Regional Manager for Media Development and ICTs)