{"id":42936,"date":"2026-08-18T08:58:02","date_gmt":"2026-08-18T06:58:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/?post_type=news&#038;p=42936"},"modified":"2026-08-18T08:58:02","modified_gmt":"2026-08-18T06:58:02","slug":"zambias-hichilema-re-elected-though-cost-of-living-pressures-dents-his-support","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/zambias-hichilema-re-elected-though-cost-of-living-pressures-dents-his-support\/","title":{"rendered":"Zambia&#8217;s Hichilema re-elected though cost of living pressures dents his support"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>Zambia&#8217;s President Hakainde Hichilema was re-elected for a second term, but the opposition \u200bleader put in an unexpectedly strong showing, capitalising on public frustration \u200cwith lingering hardships despite an economic turnaround.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Results released by the election commission in the early hours of Tuesday morning showed that Hichilema received roughly 60% of valid votes, compared \u200bwith 38% for his main challenger Brian Mundubile.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>It was Hichilema&#8217;s \u200bseventh run for the presidency, and he was widely expected to \u2060win due to the advantages of incumbency, while it was Mundubile&#8217;s first bid \u200bto become head of state.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Hichilema, 64, campaigned on his economic record since \u200btaking charge during a pandemic-era debt crisis in 2021, whereas Mundubile&#8217;s pitch to voters included that improving macroeconomic indicators had made little difference to their daily lives.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Copper-rich Zambia has been \u200ba focus of competition between China and the United States for its critical \u200bminerals.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>On \u2060the night of the election, authorities arrested 11 people including leading opposition figures in a raid that involved an exchange of gunfire, while Mundubile was present.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The next day, the electoral commission suspended vote-counting for hours due to reports of violence against polling \u200bstaff and the \u200btheft of ballot \u2060papers.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>&#8211;Reuters&#8211;<\/div>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":23533,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"news-type":[26],"class_list":["post-42936","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-general_news","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"","published_date":"","news_description":"Zambia's President Hakainde Hichilema","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/42936","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/42936\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":42937,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/42936\/revisions\/42937"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23533"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42936"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=42936"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}