United National Independence Party
The United National Independence Party (UNIP) is the oldest political party in Zambia and ruled the country from 1964 to 1991 under its chairman Kenneth Kaunda .
founding
The UNIP developed from the Northern Rhodesian African National Congress , from which the Zambian African National Congress split off, after which UNIP was founded in 1959. UNIP and the independence of Zambia are inextricably linked, as are the names Kenneth Kaunda , Mainza Chona , Simon Kapwepwe and Sikota Wina .
One-party rule
After independence in 1964, UNIP was tailored entirely to its charismatic leader Kenneth Kaunda, which culminated in the constitutional amendment of August 25, 1973, which made Zambia a “one-party participation democracy”, a Zambian word creation. The national policy was formulated in the UNIP Central Committee and the government was busy implementing its decisions. There was the one-man candidacy in presidential elections and the UNIP party congress chose this man. The second man in Zambia at that time was the Secretary General of UNIP. The first man was Kenneth Kaunda, who was continuously nominated up to and including 1991 and until then was confirmed with over 80 percent of the yes-no votes each time. The end of the Cold War brought this to an end quickly, because stable governments were no longer required, but rather stable economic growth rates. However, in view of the falling copper prices on the world market and the crippling monostructure of the Zambian economy, UNIP was never able to show that.
After the cold war
The 1991 election marked the end of UNIP. It lost, quickly got politically marginalized and maneuvered itself completely out of control with the boycott of the 1996 election . In the 2001 election , Tilyenji Kaunda , son of Kenneth Kaunda, won a good ten percent of the vote and UNIP won 13 seats in the National Assembly of Zambia , but his long-lasting legal and occasionally physical disputes with his uncle Francis Nkhoma , who briefly held the UNIP led, had damaged the reputation of UNIP. In the 2006 election in Zambia , UNIP joined the United Democratic Alliance and Tilyenji Kaunda left it to Hakainde Hichilema of the United Party for National Development to run as a candidate for this alliance.
