Zambia suspends vote count after violence

BREAKING: Zambia suspends its election vote count after violence targeting poll workers and reports of stolen ballots, with the electoral commission set to reassess within 24 hours.

Zambia has stopped counting its election votes, nationwide, effective immediately.

The electoral commission pulled the plug after violence targeting poll workers, and after marked ballot papers were stolen straight out of ballot boxes in some locations. It hasn't said where, or how widespread. It says it will reassess within 24 hours.

This was already a tense one. The vote is a referendum on President Hakainde Hichilema, whose economic reforms have collided with real anger over the cost of living. His main challenger, Brian Mundubile, leads an opposition alliance built on the late Edgar Lungu's old base. Around 8 million registered voters, more than 13,500 polling stations, and queues that formed before dawn in Lusaka, people waiting around fires in the dark to cast a ballot.

EU observers are on the ground watching all of it. For now, a country of 22 million people has voted, and nobody is allowed to count.

This is Sara White, reporting for HIT.

Source Read the original reporting at dw.com