CHILUBA EMBARKS
ON �THIRD HOUR�

Zambian president banks on a win-win situation.

Copyright: The Zambian

Faced by rising opposition against his bid for a third term, President Frederick Chiluba of Zambia today (March 5, 2001) puts into action a plan guaranteed to see him emerge victorious regardless of the outcome.

Chiluba plans to continue a push to amend the Constitution that would allow him to run in this year�s election, but only if he gets an assurance that at least two-thirds of Members of Parliament support the move.

And he wants to know the results before the April National Convention of his ruling Movement for Multiparty Democracy.

If the MMD National Convention decides in April to support a third term for Chiluba, the Constitution would have to be changed by Parliament, which is filled overwhelmingly with party members.

Chiluba, however, plans to announce his opposition to the amendment just before the April convention if the calls against the amendment continue unabated.

�Either way, he will win,� said a State House source who was part of the team that drafted the plan, codenamed �THE THIRD HOUR, �an apparent reference to the ruling MMD�s slogan in 1991.

Chiluba came to power almost 10 years ago after unseating Kenneth Kaunda, who led the country out of colonial rule and stayed in office almost three decades. During the 1991 campaign, the MMD used the slogan �The Hour Has Come� to indicate that Kaunda�s time was over.

The THIRD HOUR plan also lines up potential presidential candidates should Chiluba decide not to run. Among those named are Presidential Affairs Minister Eric Silwamba, Legal Affairs Minister Vincent Malambo, Finance Minister Katele Kalumba and Minister Without Portfolio Michael Sata.

Several top ministers including Vice President Gen. Christon Tembo have been blacklisted under the THIRD HOUR plan. Among the blacklisted ministers is another former vice president, Gen. Godfrey Miyanda, who is now education minister. Both men have spoken up against the third term and have called on Chiluba to lift the ban on presidential campaigning by members of the ruling party.

The party has banned members from discussing who should be its next candidate for president until the April National Convention.

�Whatever happens, those two will not be in the new MMD government,� the State House source said. �Whether Dr. Chiluba runs or not, forget about them.�

Chiluba�s official announcement on the third term is being timed to draw maximum benefit of the July Summit of the Organization of African Unity set for Lusaka.

Should Chiluba decide to run, he will have backing of some of OAU leaders who have stretched their presidential limits, the THIRD HOUR plan outlines.

CHANGING TIMES

The birth of Zambian democracy in 1991 was almost revolutionary, after the 27-year dictatorship of independence-leader-turned-dictator Kenneth Kaunda.

Chiluba, then a 46-year-old trade union leader, inspired high hopes for change. But opposition leaders say he has done little to reform a country where corruption is entrenched, the average annual wage is $330, 73 percent of the population lives below the national poverty line and tens of thousands of children, many of them AIDS orphans, live abandoned on the streets.

In 1996, Parliament amended the constitution to prohibit first-generation Zambians from running for president, a rule aimed squarely at preventing a comeback by Kaunda, whose parents immigrated from Malawi.

Chiluba repeatedly promised to retire when his term ends and devote himself to creating an institute for democratic studies. Late last year, the promises suddenly stopped and he has declined to publicly take a stand on changing the Constitution.

``It's not like the president is encouraging it. It's more like something that has come spontaneously from the cadres,'' Chiluba's spokesman Richard Sakala told The Associated Press.

Still, there has been evidence of a State House-backed plan.

Supporters ranging from clergy to street vendors have argued that Chiluba�s agenda is unfinished, and that he needs another term to improve conditions in the country, which has one of the world�s lowest per capita incomes and highest rates of HIV infection.

In recent weeks the governing party�s leaders in six of Zambia�s nine provinces, with a stake in preserving their jobs, have voted to remove the Constitution�s term limits.

The province that includes Lusaka was one of two whose governing-party leaders voted to stick with two terms for the president. One day after that vote, Chiluba loyalists marched through the downtown area carrying a mock coffin and calling for the ruling party�s provincial chairman, Dr. Boniface Kawimbe, to be �buried.�

Soon afterward, Kawimbe slipped out of town; nervous employees at the clinic where he works said he would be back �next month,� according to media reports.

Then, on Feb. 16, the police arrested more than 300 protesters from the United Party for National Development with six of only 22 seats not held by Chiluba�s party in the 158-member Parliament.

The opposition party said it had received no response to its request for a permit for its protest. Its leader, Anderson K. Mazoka, said the arrests showed that governmental powers are being subverted to suppress opposition to Chiluba and a third term. �It�s deteriorating right in front of our eyes,� he said. �There is no respect for the law.�

OPPOSITION PARTIES

�He�s a political fox,� Mazoka said told The New York Times. �He is very cunning. He can say, �It was not my wish, that I was not instigating it.� If he was a man of integrity, he would have said straight away, �Yes, I know you might want me to stand, but I want to respect the constitution.��

Some church groups have insisted Chiluba should retire. Civic leaders, human rights workers and opposition leaders wear green ribbons to symbolize their opposition to a third term. Some within the ruling party also are opposed; two of its lawmakers got into a fistfight over the issue earlier last month.