The Electoral Commission of Zambia (ECZ) has directed presidential aspirants who missed the provincial supporter pre-screening exercise to present all 1,000 required supporters physically during the official nomination period scheduled for next week.
ECZ Chairperson Mwangala Zaloumis said the pre-screening exercise, which was conducted across all 10 provinces, was introduced to verify supporters in advance and reduce congestion and delays during the nomination process.
She explained that while the Commission extended invitations to political parties to participate in the exercise, uptake was limited.
“Today, we had seven political parties that showed interest to have their supporters pre-processed… and only two actually came up,” Zaloumis said.
According to ECZ, the exercise was intended to streamline the nomination process by ensuring that supporters of presidential candidates are verified ahead of time, rather than during the already busy nomination period.
However, Zaloumis confirmed that failure to participate in the pre-screening does not disqualify any aspiring candidate. Instead, such candidates will be required to comply fully during nominations by presenting all their supporters at once for verification.
“If they wish to come next week, we will be open, but they have to bring the 1,000 supporters for us to be able to process them,” she said.
She further stressed that strict adherence to the nomination timetable will be enforced, warning that candidates must appear only on their allocated dates.
“If the schedule says Monday, you can’t come on Friday,” Zaloumis said.
The ECZ noted that the pre-screening initiative was introduced as part of broader reforms aimed at improving efficiency and reducing delays during high-participation electoral processes. By processing supporter data in advance, the Commission hopes to avoid congestion at nomination centres when presidential candidates formally file their papers.
Zaloumis added that preparations are underway to handle increased activity during nomination week, including the deployment of additional ICT equipment to speed up processing.
“As you saw, 100 supporters took about 40 minutes to process. On that day we will have more kits so that we can process as many as possible,” she said.
She described the pre-screening exercise as largely successful despite the low turnout from some political parties, adding that final participation figures will be confirmed once all provincial reports have been consolidated.
“Next week is the week we will know who is actually going forward to become a candidate in the election,” Zaloumis said.
Picture: ECZ Chairperson Mwangala Zaloumis
