Maravi

Malawi electoral commissioner confident of free, fair elections

Malawi electoral commissioner confident of free, fair elections
Written by Chibaula Silwamba
Friday, May 01, 2009 9:54:01 PM

MALAWI Electoral Commission (MEC) chairperson justice Anastasia Msosa has assured that the May 19 presidential and parliamentary elections in Malawi will be free, fair and transparent.

And justice Msosa revealed that MEC has excluded former president Bakili Muluzi from the ballot papers despite his legal challenge in court.

In a telephone interview from Lilongwe in Malawi, justice Msosa said although MEC had some problems with the voters' register, it would rectify those problems and proceed to hold free, fair and transparent elections whose results would be undisputed by any of the contenders.

"So far the preparations have been going on smoothly. The only challenge that we have at the moment is our voters' register; it's not complete at the moment because there are some names which cannot be found on the registers. So what we are doing is that we are comparing, not the real manual registers but part of the registers which were made in the book used for registration to ensure that those names that were missed or have been misspelt they are put back on the voters' register," justice Msosa explained. "We had sent out the voters' registers for verification but not many people took advantage of that opportunity to go and inspect the registers. In order to mitigate the problem, we have decided to do the verification on their behalf."

She explained that the MEC had been holding and would continue to hold meetings with leaders of political parties, civil society organisations and other stakeholders to ensure transparency in the electoral process.

"We are meeting stakeholders from all political parties so that they should know if we have any problems and whatever we are doing. We intend to be having frequent consultative meetings," justice Msosa said. "We have appealed to all political parties and political leaders that they should refrain from hate speech."

On some chiefs' partisan stance, justice Msosa urged them to refrain from forcing their subjects to support their [chiefs'] preferred candidates.

"Chiefs are supposed to be nonpartisan. From our side we appeal to chiefs to allow all political parties to have access to their subjects so that they [political parties] can tell them [voters] about their manifestos and why they should be voted into power," justice Msosa said.

On the offer by some political parties to provide transport to the aged and disabled to polling stations, justice Msosa said MEC had issued a statement that such offers might not be in the interest of democratic elections.

And asked whether MEC was relieved to hear that Muluzi had supported another presidential candidate, an indication that he would not continue with his bid to re-contest the elections despite the MEC disqualifying him from contesting because he had already served as president for a maximum two consecutive terms, justice Msosa responded: "I wouldn't call it a relief as such. You know he has rights so we are just observing what is happening. We are just doing our work ourselves."

Further asked if Muluzi had formally withdrawn his legal challenge against MEC from court, justice Msosa responded: "I don't think so. But what we have done is that we have gone ahead to print the ballot papers without his [name and portrait], we have almost excluded him."

Muluzi has taken MEC to court arguing that the electoral body's decision to disqualify him from standing as a presidential candidate was illegal and is asking the court to quash the decision.

Muluzi has tentatively withdrawn from standing as a presidential candidate following his recent backing of opposition Malawi Congress Party (MCP) leader John Tembo as a joint presidential candidate for his United Democratic Front (UDF) and the MCP, which last month formed an eleventh-hour electoral alliance.

Muluzi was president of Malawi, which is an eastern neighbour of Zambia, from 1994 to 2004 when he handpicked President Bingu Wa Mutharika to become his successor.

However, the duo differed after President Wa Mutharika's government arrested Muluzi on corruption charges, which the former still disputes in court.

Malawi, one of the few peaceful countries in Africa, will hold presidential and parliamentary elections this month.

President Wa Mutharika, who is seeking re-election for a second term, and six others are running in the presidential elections.

Labels: ANASTASIA MSOSA, ELECTIONS, MALAWI

posted by MrK @ 8:55 PM