AFRICAN Union Head of Observer Mission Ernest Bai Koroma says he hopes that the will of the Zambian people will be respected and accepted by political players.

Speaking to journalists, Thursday, Koroma, who is former president of Sierra Leone, said there had been no incidence of violence and hoped that it would continue after polling.

“We know that Zambia has had a character of being a peaceful country and we have not noticed any incident, we hope and pray that it will continue until after polling. More so after the polling, we do expect that it will remain peaceful and whatever becomes the will of the people of Zambia will be respected and accepted by the political players,” Boroma said.

“There seems to be a peaceful conduct and we have also observed the presence of political party agents not all of the political parties, most of the polling stations we have visited, we have an average of three political parties constantly represented. The enthusiasm that we see in people in the queues, and the peace and quiet we have observed has given us hope that if this is translated all over the country, the Zambians will end up having an election that will be peaceful. We hope it continues; we hope it is the case all over the country. We commend the people of Zambia for the great turnout and everybody is anxious to exercise his or her civic right and it is good. There is over congestion in some of the polling stations.”

He observed that there was an impressive voter turnout.

“So far, things have been going on very well from the polling stations we have observed. The polling started averagely on time; we have observed an impressive turnout of people. The queues are very long in all the stations we have visited,” said Boroma.