2014 Peter Mutharika Declared winner.
In 2014 Opposition candidate Peter Mutharika was declared the winner of Malawi’s disputed presidential election.
The leader of the Democratic Progressive Party obtained 36.4% of the vote, the electoral commission announced.
A protester died earlier after police dispersed an angry crowd demanding a recount of the ballot.
Outgoing president Joyce Banda had alleged the vote was rigged. However, to her credit she did not take the bait from Lazarus Chakwera to contest the election.
‘Law is clear’
The Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC) had asked for a 30-day extension to declare the results so that a recount could be conducted.
However, the High Court refused to delay the release of results and ordered the commission to make its announcement on Friday.
“The law is clear, there is no extension,” judge Kenyatta Nyirenda said.
Peter Mutharika is the brother of the late President Bingu wa Mutharika and had served as his foreign minister.
Former preacher Lazarus Chakwera came second with 27.8% of the vote. He represented the Malawi Congress Party, which governed from independence in 1964 until the first multi-party poll in 1994.
Mrs Banda, who came to power after the death of Bingu wa Mutharika two years ago, was third with 20.2% of the vote.
Her administration had been hit by a corruption scandal dubbed “cashgate”, which led donors to cut aid.
Fast Forward ….
Malawi’s Constitutional Court annulled the May 2019 presidential vote that declared Peter Mutharika a winner and ordered a re-run after an application from opposition parties citing irregularities.
Mutharika, Malawi president since 2014, won the election with a 38.57% share of the vote, with opposition party leader Lazarus Chakwera getting 35.41% and Deputy President Saulos Chilima, who formed his own party, had 20.24% in the final tally.
The electoral commission declared Mutharika the winner despite complaints of irregularities including results sheets with sections blotted out or altered with correction fluid.
Mutharika had pledged to crack down on corruption and revive the economy in his second five-year term.
But Chakwera, the president’s main rival, and Chilima rejected the results and filed a petition to the High Court asking it to nullify the results.
In a unanimous decision, a panel of five judges ordered that a new presidential vote be held within 150 days.
“It is almost impossible to have an election free of irregularities,” said Justice Healey Potani, who headed the panel. “However, in the present matter our finding is that the anomalies and irregularities have been so widespread, systematic and grave such that the integrity of the result was seriously compromised and can’t be trusted as the will of voters of the May 21, 2019, election.”
In a landmark ruling for the country, which is now looking so corrupt, the court described the conduct of the electoral commission as “very lacking and demonstrated incompetence.”
The status in the presidency would revert to before the elections, Potani said, which meant Chilima would be reinstated as vice president.
The court also directed Parliament to consider recalling the current electoral body, which is headed by Supreme Court of Appeal Judge Jane Ansah, to “ensure smooth conduct of fresh elections.”
The streets in Lilongwe and the commercial capital Blantyre were unusually quiet ahead of the ruling, and many businesses were shut, fearing violence, and looting from supporters of the losing side.
Security forces were out on the streets in large numbers, and the judges delivering the verdict were flown in on a military plane and arrived at the venue in armored vehicles.
Former law professor Mutharika, 79, oversaw infrastructure improvements and a slowdown in inflation in his first five-year term, but critics accuse him of cronyism and failing to tackle graft.
The way Chilima and Chakwera manipulated the courts, Peter Mutharika deserves another chance to challenge them in 2025.