Zambia: President threatens to dissolve new Parliament

Zambia’s President Michael Sata has threatened to dissolve the newly-elected Parliament and call fresh general elections if opposition MPs continue shooting down his government’s motions. This was after opposition MPs voted against the new government’s nominees to sit on the Public Accounts Committee (PAC). Zambia has a hung Parliament, where two major political parties neither have absolute majority seats. President Sata’s governing Patriotic Front (PF) has 60 elected and eight nominated legislators totalling 68 - short of a two-thirds majority - in a 158-member National Assembly, which still has three vacant seats.