Government Warns Against Coordinated Election Disinformation Campaign

The Ministry of Information and Media has warned Zambians against a coordinated campaign of deliberate disinformation being spread while votes from Thursday's general election are still being counted.

In a statement issued today, Permanent Secretary Thabo Kawana said the Government had noted with grave concern a network of opposition-aligned pages and accounts circulating serious and completely false claims designed to sow fear and confusion and to destabilise a peaceful nation.

The Ministry said the scale of the campaign was such that even the United Nations had been forced to respond, after fabricated content misusing UN emblems falsely claimed that UN observers had congratulated a candidate. The UN has publicly clarified that it has no election observers in Zambia and that the claims are false and misleading.

"If those responsible will invent statements from the UN itself, the nation can judge the value of anything else they publish," the statement said.

The Ministry stressed that nobody has won or lost the election until the Electoral Commission of Zambia declares the results, adding that the Commission alone has that authority and anyone claiming otherwise is misleading the public.

Zambians were urged to remain calm and patient, to rely on the ECZ and reputable news outlets, and to treat unverifiable claims from anonymous pages as fabrications. The statement described the campaign as the desperate acts of those who fear the verdict of the Zambian people, and called on all political parties to honour the peace pledge and allow the Commission to complete its work without interference.