No Pvt, Insists ECZ Director

3 May 2011

THE Electoral Commission of Zambia (ECZ) has said parallel vote tabulation (PVT) system will not be allowed because the proponents of the process have failed to guarantee that they would not announce unofficial results.

ECZ director Priscilla Isaacs said out of 6,456 polling stations spread out across the country, the institutions planning PVT wanted to have results based on 10 per cent of all the polling stations, which she described as irregular.

Ms Isaacs was speaking at a media conference at Mulungushi International Conference Centre organised by the World Press Freedom Day (WPFD) national organising committee under the theme ‘Ethical reporting for a free and peaceful electoral process’.

She said the commission held a meeting with the pro-PVT institutions and failed to deal with critical questions.

She urged Zambians to understand that ECZ would not stop organisations from adding figures as released by ECZ.

“PVT by definition is a sample-based observation. For example, out of 6,456 polling stations and polling streams, they would have a position based on 10 per cent of all these polling stations. That is the worry of the commission,” she said.

Ms Isaacs said PVT was stopped even in 1991 when an international organisation applied to conduct it but encouraged political parties and the civil society to send monitors to the polling centres.

Ms Isaacs said Zambians should have confidence in the ECZ process and those aggrieved should seek court action.

She said the Constitution Amendment Bill which flopped in Parliament recently would have facilitated the enforcement of the new Constitution with provisions to allow ECZ to make quickrulings on electoral disputes.

She also said ECZ would only start regulating political campaigns when the date of elections was announced and that the present unofficial campaigns were allowed due to to freedom of expression which the commission could not stop.

Ms Isaac said every political party was running campaigns and some had published manifestos in the print media as part of their unofficial campaigns, which ECZ would not stop because the Constitution provided for freedom of expression.

Meanwhile, Information and Broadcasting Services Deputy Minister Angela Chifire has challenged the media to reclaim their lost dignity where each media house and individuals were being associated with known biases in their reporting.

Officially opening the conference yesterday, Ms Chifire said she was worried that even voters were aware that media houses had taken political sides.

Ms Chifire, who is today expected to officiate at the 2011 World Press Freedom Day celebrations in Chipata, said she was impressed with the array of resource persons at the conference.

She said the objectives that the conference was set to achieve were rich and included peaceful, free and fair elections, balanced reporting and reduced incidents of violence against journalists.

WPFD national organising committee chairperson Amos Chanda challenged the Government to get rid of the limitations in the coverage radius given to radio stations.

Mr Chanda said the Government should avoid earning a bad name by limiting the radius because the same radio stations were broadcasting internationally via the Internet.

He praised the Ministry of Information for being the biggest donor to WPFD, which underscored the fact that media associations would remain close to the ministry.

Zambia Episcopal Conference spokesperson Paul Samasumo said people were critical to the works of the media.

Father Samasumo said ethics was not negotiable for the media and pledged that the media would not be used as tools for telling lies and divisions but to operate as source of positive change.

The conference was attended by, among other key players, representatives of political parties, who included UNIP national coordinator Martha Kayuni and Patriotic Front deputy secretary general Bridget Atanga.

AllAfrica – All the Time