Key takeaways
- Trevor Mwiinde took the oath of office as Choma South MP on 8 September, one of 112 MPs sworn in by Speaker Nelly Mutti at Parliament Buildings in Lusaka.
- Days earlier, on One Love Radio in Lusaka, he had urged candidates who lost the 13 August election to accept the result and let newly elected MPs serve rather than tie them up in court.
- His comments land as 67 parliamentary election petitions, close to 30% of the 224 seats declared, sit before Zambia’s High Courts, 41 of them filed in Lusaka alone.
- Under electoral law, an MP facing a petition keeps the seat until the case is decided, a process the law requires to conclude within 90 days of filing.
- Mwiinde asked specifically that newly elected youthful and female MPs be given room to work without “unnecessary distractions.”
Trevor Mwiinde raised his right hand and took the oath of office as Member of Parliament for Choma South on 8 September, one of 112 MPs sworn in at Parliament Buildings in Lusaka by Speaker Nelly Mutti. Choma South is a new constituency, carved out in the 2025 delimitation exercise, and Mwiinde’s swearing-in formally closes out a contest he had already spent the past three weeks talking about from the other side of the podium: as UPND deputy national youth chairman urging losing candidates elsewhere to accept theirs.
“Let us respect the outcome”
Speaking on One Love Radio in Lusaka days before his own swearing-in, Mwiinde had appealed to candidates who lost Zambia’s 13 August general election to let the process stand. “With due respect, let us respect the outcome of the immediate past elections and give the newly elected Members of Parliament an opportunity to serve,” he said.
He was speaking directly to the backlog of election petitions that losing candidates have filed against the results, and he singled out one group he wants protected from the disruption: newly elected youthful and female MPs, who he said should be allowed to work, serve their constituents and deliver on their mandates without “unnecessary distractions.”
Inside the petitions backlog
The numbers explain why Mwiinde felt the appeal was necessary. Once the 14-day window to file after the 13 August vote closed, 67 parliamentary election petitions had landed in Zambia’s High Courts, touching close to 30% of the 224 parliamentary seats the Electoral Commission of Zambia declared. Lusaka High Court alone is carrying 41 of them. Losing candidates cite grounds ranging from vote buying to defamation and political violence.
Zambian electoral law gives an MP whose election is challenged the right to keep the seat while the petition runs its course, and it requires each case to be heard and determined in open court within 90 days of filing. That timeline means most of the current backlog should be resolved by early December, but it also means dozens of newly elected MPs are governing under a live legal cloud for their first months in office. Not every petition survives that long: Kanchibiya’s Sunday Chanda withdrew his own challenge this month, citing a doubled Constituency Development Fund allocation that followed from the same delimitation exercise that created seats like Choma South.
A crowded day of oaths
Mwiinde was in good company on 8 September. The Speaker also swore in Jacqueline Sabao for a second term as Chikankata MP, Kakubo for a third term as Kapiri Mposhi West MP, Romeo Kangombe for a third term as Sesheke East MP, and independent MP Iris Kaingu for the Mwandi seat. For Mwiinde, a first-time MP taking up a constituency that did not exist at the last election, the day carried a different weight: it was both his own first appearance on the order paper and, in his telling, evidence that the process he had been defending on air actually delivers a working Parliament.
What Choma South is asking for
Mwiinde used his first remarks as MP to lay out what the constituency needs rather than dwell on the campaign. He pointed to farmers who depend on dams for gardening and livestock and struggle through drought years, and pledged to push for better road networks and the reopening of the dormant Masuku railway line to support animal husbandry in the area. On social infrastructure, he was blunt: “Choma South, Choma Rural has never had a hospital,” and the constituency has no mortuary and only one government secondary school. He said he would lobby for a hospital, mortuary facilities and a tertiary technical training institution.
Why it matters beyond Choma South
A parliamentary term that opens with roughly a third of its seats under legal challenge is not, on its own, a governance crisis: the law anticipates exactly this scenario and builds in a fixed clock to resolve it. But it does mean donors, investors and civil servants dealing with the new intake in Southern Province and elsewhere should expect some MPs’ authority to carry an asterisk until their petitions clear, and it puts a premium on the courts meeting the 90-day deadline rather than letting cases drift. Mwiinde’s appeal, echoed by other UPND figures since the election, is as much about protecting the functioning of the Ninth Assembly as it is about individual seats.
Related coverage
- Jacqueline Sabao Sworn In for Second Term as Chikankata MP
- Kakubo Sworn In as MP for Kapiri Mposhi West, His Third Parliamentary Term
- Sesheke East’s Romeo Kangombe Sworn In for a Third Term, Says Development “Has No Finish Line”
- Independent MP Iris Kaingu Takes Mwandi Seat: What Her Win Means for Western Province’s Economy
- Sunday Chanda Withdraws Kanchibiya Election Petition, Cites Doubled CDF From Delimitation
- The Economics of Zambia’s 2026 Election
- 2026 Zambia Election Results Dashboard
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