Widowed PF candidate Susan Kawandami polled 6 976 votes, beating Ndola businessman Frank Ng'ambi of President Rupiah Banda's ruling Movement for Multi-party Democracy (MMD) who polled 4 539 votes in the by-election.
Although the newly formed Alliance for Democracy and Development (ADD) and former president Kenneth Kaunda's United National Independence Party (UNIP) contested the seat, the battle was mainly between Michael Sata's PF, the MMD, and the United Party for National Development (UPND) of Haakainde Hichilema. Showing how UNIP has sunk into oblivion after ruling Zambia for nearly 32 years, its candidate Poko Mambwe got a paltry 221 votes, thereby failing to outperform political novice Adrian Banda of the ADD who managed to get 412 votes. Feminists have hailed Kawandami's victory as she is the first woman to become the Member of Parliament (MP) for Chifubu since Zambia's independence from Britain in 1964. This constituency - which fell vacant when its sitting MP Benson Mwamba died early this year - has served to propel several politicians into the political limelight, including Zambia's third president the late Levy Mwanawasa and Frederick Chiluba's right hand man at the Zambia Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) who served as minister in both Chiluba's and Mwanawasa's governments, Newstead Zimba. The PF/UPND pact has performed so well in several by-elections over the past year that the MMD will have to work hard to survive the combined force of the two major opposition parties in next year's elections when Banda will attempt to win his first five-year term. So far, the opposition alliance has captured the Kasama Central, Mufumbwe and Solwezi Central constituencies in the past 12 months. The two parties have agreed not to compete with each other in by-elections and have reportedly agreed on the idea of fielding a single candidate in next year's presidential elections. In the Kasama Central by-election, the PF/UPND candidate, Geoffrey Bwalya, polled 10 688 votes, trouncing former football star Burton Mugala of the ruling MMD who polled merely 4 184 votes. The by-election was held in October last year after PF legislator Savior Chishimba resigned from the party. The ruling party also lost the November 2009 Solwezi Central constituency following the death of Local Government and Housing Minister Ben Tetamashimba. PF/UPND pact candidate Watson Lumba polled 5 669 votes, beating Albert Chifita of the MMD who got 4 557 votes in the by-election held on April 30, 2010.
