LUSAKA: The new information minister is a confessed drug trafficker. While nearly three-quarters of the population earns less than a $1 a day, the new foreign minister was cleared of involvement in the theft of nearly $500,000 of public money. Virtually every day, evidence surfaces to suggest that the unpopular governing party rigged last month’s presidential election in favor of a candidate whose sometimes bumbling syntax has earned him the nickname “the vegetable.”

If Zambia seemed on the verge of violent upheaval in the days immediately following the Dec. 27 election that opposition politicians, international monitors and diplomats described as deeply flawed, everything has returned to normal in this unperturbable country.

The protests in which demonstrators confronted police and soldiers with rocks, sticks and epithets have subsided. A few women marched here last week to denounce the election results, baring their breasts in a traditional African gesture conveying a sense of shame. Shouting has been replaced by a shrug of the shoulders, a knowing roll of the eyes and resigned humour as this country of 11 million has gone back to business as if nothing happened. “It’s obvious to everyone that the elections were rigged,” said Benwil Mwale, a farmer. “Any other nation would have erupted in violence, but Zambians don’t like to kick up dust. It’s just not in our nature.”

To some here, that tendency is more of a liability than an asset. Less than 15 percent of the workforce holds a full-time job and more than 80 percent of the population lives in desperate poverty. The governing Movement for Multiparty Democracy (MMD) is widely regarded as corrupt, and last year, former president Frederick Chiluba spent more to build new chalets for a summit of southern African leaders than the government spent on health care.

Opposition politicians have appealed to Mwanawasa to remove the two men from office, but he has refused, saying that Mwaanga’s indiscretions occurred long ago and that Kalumba has not been convicted of any crime. “People are very upset about those two men,” said Bruce Simkufise, a taxi driver . —Dawn/LAT-WP News Service (c) The Washington Post.