Hakoola said the number of youths in leadership positions is low in Zambia hence the need for youths to be trained in various leadership roles.

Hakoola told ZANIS in an interview in Ndola yesterday that the Research Institute is training young people from all political parties and the community in Lusaka and Copperbelt provinces.

He explained that youths in the country are mostly used as tools of violence instead of taking up leadership roles.

“We are a platform that engage youths in issues of governance and leadership to ensure that we build their capacity in taking up leadership roles by reducing the trend of young people being used as tools of violence,” he said.

He added that the trainings are aimed at enhancing capacity of young people to participate in democratic processes by varying for public office.

“Currently from our research conducted, we have seen that out of the total 156 members of Parliament, only three are considered as youths.

Therefore, we want to ensure that youths up their game in taking up leadership positions, the importance of taking part in voting and issues of how to deal with dialogue.

You find that most of the time youths do not dialogue but engage in violent activities, that is why we are undertaking trainings for them to ensure that they know their core duty in governance issues,” he said.

And Lumuno Nyimba one of the trained youths from Ndola said the training has enlightened them on how to be responsible as young people.

“As youths, we have been very relaxed in terms of taking up leadership roles because we limit our capacity and what we can do. Hence the training has really opened up our thinking and we will be more proactive in dealing with governance issues,” she said.

She added that youth participation in leadership roles will help the country move forward as they have a lot of potential.

Ezra Mushipi another trained participate said youths have huge role to play in issues of governance.

He thanked research institute for training them and explained that he will use the information to be models of change.

He called on all the youths in the country not to be used as tools of violence even as the country heads to the polls next year. -Lusaka Times

In a statement to the media, CLRI Director Mundia Paul Hakola said his organization is concerned that the rights of assembly and speech are being curtailed by officials using state institutions meant to protect the citizenry.

He observed that in the recent past there has been a number of incidents where the right of speech and assembly have been threatened and some state institutions that have a mandate protect citizens have actually been used to threaten these same rights and liabilities.

“Zambia is heading to the polls in 2021 and the government has a duty to ensure that it upholds principals of democratic state and that is to listen to descending views and not silence them. The views of those who don’t share your view allow you to think outside the box and also to interrogate the policies and decisions on a table with different view but when you don’t allow others to speak and assembly then we slowing heading to a state of one-party state.

“We noticed that critical voices in the country have been silenced through state agencies which is a matter of concern and an assault on the whole essence of democracy. The state and party in power needs to learn that the best and unbiased advice or view sometimes doesn’t come from those we share the same view with but those that are critical are actually helping us to become better, democracy is consultative by nature and dialogue is key to achieve good governance,” he said.

Mr Hakola said freedom of speech and assembly is one of the benchmarks that is critical in democratic governance especially in an election year that the country in going in.

“Freedom of speech and assembly is one of the benchmarks that is critical in democratic governance especially in an election year that we going in and non -state actors such civil society have a duty to do a lot civic education as head to the polls, so are other actors that need to freely enjoy their rights to effectively participate in the democratic processes. The institute is however concerned by the unfair application of the public order act and also the constant infringement on the freedom of expression that is clearly demonstrated by the closure of Prime TV, treats to arrest youths for wanting to conduct peaceful demonstration and many other acts which we have documented.

“We are concerned by the slowly shrinking space in our democratic tents in Zambia, if the harassing of citizens by state agencies continues, we might soon be categorized as state without free speech and no right of assembly.”

He said failure to address the concerns his organization has raised will negatively impact on the country’s standing as well as affect citizens participation in next year’s elections.

“We call on the human rights commission to release a report on the state of governance regarding freedom of speech and assembly in Zambia, we take this opportunity to invite the international organisations concerned with human rights to take keen interest in Zambia and begin to aggressively monitor the human rights situation in Zambia and we also call the Zambia Police and the ministry of home affairs to engage with all stakeholders and find common ground that will head towards a path of transparency and accountability in the way the public order Act is being administered.

Failure to take necessary steps to deal with the human rights situation will badly affect our standing as country and will also citizen participation in 2021 elections,” he said.

VARIOUS political parties say the proposed hiking of nomination fees by the Electoral Commission of Zambia (ECZ) is unreasonable.

In a statement, Wednesday, Patriotic Front secretary general Davies Mwila said the party did not support the proposal to hike, describing the suggested fees as discriminatory.

“PF does not support the upward adjustment of nomination fees announced by the Electoral Commission of Zambia (ECZ). As a militant organization of revolutionary peasants, workers and intellectuals that believes in equitable participation in the affairs of our nation by all citizens regardless of socio-economic status, the Patriotic Front wishes to register its strongest displeasure with the proposed upward revision of nomination fees as recently announced by the Electoral Commission of Zambia. The proposed upward revision is not only elitist, but it would also be tantamount to the commercialization of participation in democratic processes where the destiny of the majority “have nots” is hijacked by a minority “haves”,” stated Mwila.

“Patriotic Front remains committed to the participation and representation in democratic processes of youth, women and differently abled persons as a matter of right and not privilege. We support their proportional representation in Parliament as proposed under Bill 10, and we further call for lower nomination fees in order to maximize involvement of the youth, women and differently abled persons in running the affairs of the nation. In order to safeguard our country’s democracy, we call for downward adjustment instead. Zambia must not be put up for auction to the highest bidder.”

And UPND deputy secretary general Patrick Mucheleka, however, said his party was still on the fence regarding the proposal.

“We have to be very careful and we are aware that the PF is trying to use Zambia Centre for Inter Party Dialogue (ZCID) which is an extension of the PF so they want to use it to bargain the fees. This is why we will not rush at either condemning, agreeing or disagreeing. We are appreciating that indeed democracy has to thrive but we also have to put into account a lot of factors. We shall get back to ECZ with our proposals in the next few days once we make the necessary consultations,” said Mucheleka.

But National Democratic Congress (NDC) leader Chishimba Kambwili said the commission should have consulted the stakeholders before proposing the fees as they were unreasonable.

“If we want to enhance our democracy and have the people’s faith in governance what is supposed to be done is that there must be consultations. Before ECZ came up with those figures, they would have called all stakeholders political parties, Civil Society and the charges so that these issues are agreed before they go to the ears of the general public. But in the nutshell, the prices are unreasonable and I think that must be withdrawn. There is no way…even the K7, 500 for the MPs is too much for a lot of people. So if we have to enhance our democracy, we must think of the decision and policies that we are coming up with in commiserate with the general earning and the financial status of our country. This idea of copy and paste will put us into so many problems,” said Kambwili.

Meanwhile, People’s Alliance for Change (PAC) president Andyford Banda suggested that the commission lobbies for funds from the government.

He said his party would be affected because a lot of young people would not be able to participate in the elections.

“The decision by ECZ to increase the nomination fees is not welcome. We don’t wasn’t to create a situation where democracy or people who should vie for positions in this country are those that are deemed to be rich. I think the idea of democracy is to give every citizen a platform to actually vie for positions in the country. One of the things they need to do is to mobilize funds from the government. One of the reasons why we pay tax is because they need to make sure that this democratic process is maintained,” said Banda.

“We believe this will disadvantage young people especially those who want to stand as councilors and MPs and for the ECZ to ask them to pay a K25,000 that is not fair. On top of that, they need to mobilize funds to do their campaign. We would like to call on the ECZ to be realistic and the fees to be revised otherwise we will be selling leadership in this country where the highest bidder takes the position. As PAC this will disadvantage us because a lot of young people will not be able to pay,”

Meanwhile, Continental Leadership Research Institute director (CLRI) Mundia Hakoola said the proposed fees would reduce the quality of candidates that participated in the elections as many people might not afford the fees.

“The proposed fees will also reduce the quality of candidates to participate as many might not be able to afford the fees making therefore comprising the quality of candidates that we will have in parliament and various decision making organs, already we have Members of Parliament whose level of participation in the house is very poor and doesn’t inspire any confidence to our generation and challenges that we face as young people,” stated Hakoola.

According to a proposal by the ECZ, a presidential nomination fee is K150,000 from the current K60,000 while a female presidential candidate and persons with disabilities will pay K120,000.

A male parliamentary candidate will be required to pay K25,000 from the current K7,500 and a female and persons with disabilities candidates will be paying K20,000.

The Continental Leadership Research Institute (CLRI) says increasing nomination fees by the Electoral Commission of Zambia ECZ is a hindrance to youth and women participation in elective representation.

In a statement issued to the media Mundia Hakoola the Institute’s Director noted that the increase in the nomination fee by the country’s electoral body goes against the call for deliberate affirmative action that would allow youths and women to participate in the Democratic process of the country.

“The proposal to increase nomination fees by Electoral Commission of Zambia will reduce the participation of youths and women to aspire as elected representatives at various levels.

“There should be deliberate affirmative action that allows youth and women to participate in democratic process such as aspiring for public office and various levels. The proposal to increase the fees for nomination will negatively affect the participation of the youth and the women by reducing the number of youth and women who aspire for elective office,” he said.

He explains that the increase will in the fees will only add on the already existing challenges of low representation by women and youths even when the two groups are the majority in the country.

“The increase of the nomination fees is by more than 50% of the previous and one wonders where the logic is in increasing theses fees by more than 50%. Statistics already show that there only 17% women parliament and only 3 elected youth out of the 156, these numbers are already a source of concern to the women and youth and the proposed increase will reduce their participation further. Youth and women are the majority in Zambia and there is need for their interest to be well represented at decision making forums such as national assembly so that legislation that favors their interest is tabled and well protected.

“The proposed fees will also reduce the quality of candidates to participate as many might not be able to afford the fees making therefore comprising the quality of candidates that we will have in parliament and various decision making organs, already we have some Members of Parliament whose level of participation in the house is very poor and doesn’t inspire any confidence to our generation and challenges that we face as young people,” he said.

He has since proposed to ECZ to find ways of ensuring effective participation of women and the youth in elections.

“ECZ should instead find ways of ensuring that youth and women participate in elections through affirmative action that will level the playing field and the proposal to increase nomination fees doesn’t address that it in fact makes the situation worse.
Our call is for ECZ to drop the proposal of increasing the nomination fees and consider ways of ensuring that youth and women participate in electoral cycle effectively without the limitation of high nomination fees,” he said.