News / Africa
Zambia to have a white President
29 Oct 2014 at 12:03hrs | Views
Zambia's vice-president Guy Scott will become Africa's first white head of state since South Africa's FW de Klerk in 1994 following the death of Zambian President Michael Sata who died in London, where he had been receiving treatment for an undisclosed illness.
The Zambian constitution says a new presidential election must be held within 90 days, with most analysts saying Scott is unlikely to run because of citizenship restrictions.
It is now not immediately clear who will succeed the president. After he left the country, Defence Minister Edgar Lungu was named as acting president.
Vice-President Guy Scott has regularly stood in for the president at official events. Unconfirmed reports are that he is to take over, however, he is of Scottish descent and his parents were not born in Zambia, so he may fall foul of a constitutional clause on parentage which would nullify his candidacy as a long term replacement.
According to the Zambia constitution, elections for a new President will need to be held within the next 90 days during which time an acting president will in the interim run the country. The issue may be decided by the Zambian cabinet which is meeting this morning, 29 October 2014, to discuss the matter
Known as "King Cobra" for his venomous tongue, Mr. Sata became president in September 2011, defeating the then incumbent Rupiah Banda whose party had been in power for 20 years.
Sata left Zambia for medical treatment abroad on Oct. 19 accompanied by his wife and family members, according to a brief government statement at the time that gave no further details.
There was no official update on his condition and Lungu, secretary general of Sata's Patriotic Front party, had to lead celebrations last week to mark the landlocked nation's 50th anniversary of independence from Britain.
Concern over Sata's health had been mounting since June when he disappeared from the public eye without explanation and was then reported to be getting medical treatment in Israel.
He missed a scheduled speech at the U.N. General Assembly in September amid reports that he had fallen ill in his New York hotel. A few days before that, he had attended the opening of parliament in Lusaka, joking: "I am not dead."
Sata has not been seen in public since he returned to Zambia from New York in late September.
The Zambian constitution says a new presidential election must be held within 90 days, with most analysts saying Scott is unlikely to run because of citizenship restrictions.
It is now not immediately clear who will succeed the president. After he left the country, Defence Minister Edgar Lungu was named as acting president.
Vice-President Guy Scott has regularly stood in for the president at official events. Unconfirmed reports are that he is to take over, however, he is of Scottish descent and his parents were not born in Zambia, so he may fall foul of a constitutional clause on parentage which would nullify his candidacy as a long term replacement.
According to the Zambia constitution, elections for a new President will need to be held within the next 90 days during which time an acting president will in the interim run the country. The issue may be decided by the Zambian cabinet which is meeting this morning, 29 October 2014, to discuss the matter
Sata left Zambia for medical treatment abroad on Oct. 19 accompanied by his wife and family members, according to a brief government statement at the time that gave no further details.
There was no official update on his condition and Lungu, secretary general of Sata's Patriotic Front party, had to lead celebrations last week to mark the landlocked nation's 50th anniversary of independence from Britain.
Concern over Sata's health had been mounting since June when he disappeared from the public eye without explanation and was then reported to be getting medical treatment in Israel.
He missed a scheduled speech at the U.N. General Assembly in September amid reports that he had fallen ill in his New York hotel. A few days before that, he had attended the opening of parliament in Lusaka, joking: "I am not dead."
Sata has not been seen in public since he returned to Zambia from New York in late September.
Source - online
