By Brian Matambo | Lusaka, Zambia

The fight over Zambia’s Constitution has entered its most serious phase yet, as six of the country’s most respected institutions have dragged the State to the Constitutional Court, accusing President Hakainde Hichilema of running an illegal and deceptive amendment process designed to reshape political power ahead of 2026.

The 24 page petition, filed by the Law Association of Zambia, NGOCC, EFZ, CCZ, ZCCB and the LCK Freedom Foundation, reads like a charge sheet against a government that has forgotten the limits of its authority. The petitioners argue that the entire 2025 amendment process is unconstitutional because it is executive driven, rushed, opaque and fundamentally dishonest about its intentions.

This challenge did not emerge from nowhere. Earlier this year Government tabled Bill 7 of 2025, a sweeping constitutional proposal that would alter constituency boundaries, increase parliamentary seats to 211, introduce proportional representation, change rules for candidates who resign or die, adjust tenure for MPs and councils, and redefine the electoral landscape. Analysts saw it immediately for what it was, a political project wrapped in legal language.

Before the Bill could gain traction, Munir Zulu and Celestine Mukandila took the matter to the Constitutional Court and won a landmark judgment. On 27 June 2025 the Court delivered a powerful ruling that the Constitution can only be amended after wide and genuine consultations with the people and through an independent, expert led, people driven process. Executive control was expressly rejected.

Rather than follow the ruling, the petitioners argue that Government chose to circumvent it. On 2 October 2025 President Hichilema appointed a 25 member Technical Committee to consult citizens and draft amendments. The problem is that the Committee has no legal foundation. It was not created by statute, statutory instrument or Gazette notice. It emerged only through State House press statements.

Its Terms of Reference also mirror the content of Bill 7 almost word for word. The petition argues that this is evidence of a predetermined outcome dressed up as consultation. Several members of the Committee previously served on the ECZ Electoral Reform Technical Committee that authored key parts of Bill 7. The Committee was given only 12 days to consult the entire country, a process that chiefs, civil society and major church bodies have rejected as a mock exercise.

Monitoring reports from NGOs, it is understood that venues are announced late, sessions are conducted in English without translators, citizens are being guided to change their submissions and community members sign documents they do not fully understand. Traditional leaders from Luapula, Northern and Eastern provinces have publicly distanced themselves from the process, calling it rushed, exclusionary and politically suspicious.

The petition makes a simple but powerful argument. Article 79 of the Constitution sets the exclusive route for constitutional amendment. The President has no authority under Article 92 to create parallel structures to alter the nation’s supreme law. Any attempt to do so is unconstitutional, illegal and invalid.

In a country where the Constitution has already been used and abused for partisan advantage in the past, this petition lands with the weight of history. It signals that civil society, churches and legal bodies are no longer willing to stand by while the Constitution is handled like a campaign tool.

The petitioners want the Court to declare the entire process null and void. They want the Technical Committee dissolved. They want any Bill arising from its work declared illegal. And they want future constitutional reform to follow the Court’s ruling in the Munir Zulu and Celestine Mukandila BILL 7 case, driven by the people and insulated from political manipulation.

With the 2026 elections on the horizon, the stakes could not be higher. Zambia has been here before. The difference this time is that the guardians of accountability have taken the battle to the highest court and placed the Constitution itself at the centre of national protection.

This is not just a legal fight. It is a defining confrontation over who truly owns Zambia’s Constitution. The Executive or the people.