BLANTYRE-(MaraviPost)—Saulos Chilima, who was the presidential candidate of UTM in the 2019 election, has maintained that he will still go with Lazarus Chakwera in the forthcoming election saying the Supreme Court of Appeal gives him a right to withdraw his candidature.
Chilima was reacting to the Supreme Court ruling in an election appeal case in which President Peter Mutharika and Malawi Electoral Commission were pushing for overturning of the Constitutional Court verdict that saw Mutharika’s victory nullified, thereby ordering a fresh election within 150 days.
In its ruling, the Supreme Court has maintained the ConCourt’s position with an extension that no new presidential candidate should take part in the fresh poll and that the old voters’ roll be used.
“According to the ruling, only those who participated in the last election are allowed to participate in the fresh election. So I am eligible to vie for the presidential position. However, I also have a right to withdraw my candidature and pair with Dr. Chakwera as we did on Wednesday during presentation of nomination papers. So we will go in the fresh election as an alliance,” he said.
Chilima has also expressed satisfaction over the court’s decision to stop MEC from registering new voters saying that has solved the issue of registering minors which was prevalent in the DPP stronghold.
“I am happy that the position has been made that only those who voted in last election must participate in the fresh election. If you did not participate in the last year’s election, you can’t claim that your rights were violated.
“So we are happy that the underaged voters can’t vote. The only thing is that they have wasted blank cards. We could have kept those IDs for good use in future. If wish they were punished to bear that cost. Because it was unnecessary and total ridiculous as I said two days back,”
The court has also maintained the 50+1 majority as ordered by the lower court.