TheCable

Guy Scott, Zambia’s interim leader, has announced a presidential by-election for January 20, while calling for calm and tolerance in the country.

After the death of Michael Sata, the late president of the country, Guy Scott became the interim president and the continent’s first white leader since the end of apartheid in South Africa in 1994.

Since his assumption of office, there has been tense opposition against his continuance as the country’s head.

Addressing a news conference, Scott said he hoped all contestants, both from the ruling Patriotic Front (PF) and opposition parties, would desist from violence in the proposed elections.

“It is my prayer that peace continues during the campaigning and the presidential by-elections,” he said.

Earlier, Scott sacked a presidential front-runner, Edgar Lungu, as PF secretary-general on November 3 without due explanation, only to reinstate him after bowing to pressure a day after.

Scott is barred from running for president in Africa’s second-biggest copper producer, on the claims that his parents were born in Scotland.

Although no date has been fixed for primary election, supporters of Lungu want the PF’s central committee to pick the party’s candidate, while Scott says a party general conference should choose.