Zambia's Hopeful Election

The Ballot Box: Elections Around the World

On 12th August Zambians went to the polls in an election which was surrounded by concerns around creeping authoritarianism and the actions of President Lungu to skew the vote in his favour. A knife edge contest was predicted. Instead opposition candidate Hakainde Hichilema won a landslide victory and his UPND party won a parliamentary majority, reversing Zambia's course towards authoritarianism. We dive into the main issues of the campaign and Zambia's history of alternating democratisation and authoritarianisation. To do so we're joined by our unofficial Sub-Saharan Africa correspondent Michael Bankole of Kings College London.

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