and called a referendum. In mid 1990, "The Movement for Multiparty Democracy (MMD), an unofficial alliance of political opponents of the Government, was formed" under the leadership of the recently ousted Finance Minister Arthur Wina and the leader of the Zambian trade unions, Frederick Chiluba, to fight the democratic corner in the referendum. Kaunda then postponed the referendum by a year, but by then the momentum was too strong even in his own party. By the end of 1990 Kaunda announced that multi-party elections would be held in October 1991. The "MMD chose not to disband into many small parties that could easily be defeated by the UNIP. Instead the MMD registered as one party and elected the popular trade unionist Fredrick Chiluba as its presidential candidate." Though the churches steered a careful course so as not to actively promote any party Phiri notes that "pro-democracy political sermons became frequent in many churches," but concludes, "despite their bias towards change, the Churches commendably maintained a non-partisan role, emerging as critical agents of reconciliation during critical times." Churches were to hold days of prayer for the election process, including election night itself, and, "in the few months before the elections, the churches made probably their greatest contribution to a peaceful transition. They joined to form the Christian Churches Monitoring Group, which then became the Zambia Elections Monitoring Coordinating Committee (ZEMEC), which set out to train a grassroots army to observe procedures at all polling stations on election day." Jimmy Carter who led the international team of observers notes that at a time of "political impasse", between Chiluba and Kaunda the Anglican Cathedral in Lusaka provided the "acceptable meeting place for both parties. Their meeting, which began with shared prayer, resulted eventually in a redrafting of the constitution that opened the way for the elections." Chiluba later credited Carter as being sent from God. Christians wary of Kaunda's somewhat unorthodox theological positions in the past were further antagonised when the President began openly flirting with Eastern Religious beliefs. The growing perception in Zambia was "that Kaunda had not just forsaken true Christianity, but had fallen under the sway of Eastern gurus… in the 1980s he became linked with a Dr M. A. Ranganathan and established his David Universal Temple at State House." Phiri states that the association with "Eastern Religions… was not acceptable to Zambian Christians." The tensions caused by the perceived