Zambian President Levy Mwanawasa has cancelled elections for senior positions in his ruling Movement for Multiparty Democracy (MMD) party, saying some leaders vying for positions are corrupt.
Mwanawasa, who has made rooting out corruption in Zambia the focus of his rule, accused some MMD officials of frustrating his anti-graft fight.
"We have suspended the elections for the position of (Copperbelt provincial) chairman because of corruption," Mwanawasa said on state television late on Sunday.
"The more we talk about corruption and the need to remove it, the more the people in the party engage in it. I am not amused."
Mwanawasa in 2002 launched Zambia's biggest anti-corruption crackdown since independence from Britain in 1964, targeting mainly his former mentor, ex-president Frederick Chiluba, and former senior government officials.
He said he had evidence that some senior MWD officials in the country's vast Copperbelt province were corrupting delegates to a local party conference in Ndola, 300 km (190 miles) north of Lusaka, in a bid to win elections.
Comments
Comments are closed.