BLANTYRE-(MaraviPost)-Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC) Chief Elections Officer Sam Alfandika has resigned after three years in the job.
Alfandika is reportedly taking up an international job.
In a press statement available to The Maravi Post on Wednesday, April 27, 2021, MEC chairperson Chifundo Kachale disclosed that the commission received a Notice of Resignation from Alfandika on April 26, 2021.
Kachale added that Alfandika has already proceeded on his accrued annual leave pending the effective operation of the resignation.
“In the meantime, the Commission shall be meeting to discuss the relevant modalities for filling the vacancy arising from this development, bearing in mind the critical role of this office in the effective discharge of our business at all levels,” said Kachale.
Alfandika started working as MEC Chief Elections in January, 2018 and oversaw a turbulent period at the commission where he was responsible for managing electoral processes.
There were calls for Alfandika and commissioners of MEC to resign following the 2019 Tripartite Elections. Over a period of nine months, Malawians took to the streets to protest the results of the presidential elections in which MEC declared Peter Mutharika as the winner.
The results of the polls were nullified last year by the Constitutional Court over widespread irregularities, a decision which was later upheld by the Supreme Court.
In 2020, MEC managed the Fresh Presidential Elections where President Lazarus Chakwera was elected. The commission also conducted by-elections for several parliamentary seats last month. Both elections were described as free and fair by stakeholders.
The only explanation I have heard which has a teeny-weeny bit of proximity to being rational for the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP)’s retention of Jean Mathanga and Linda Kunje as Commissioners at the Electoral Commission is “continuity”.
In everyday conduct of business, maintaining a modicum of continuity does make sense.
Exceptions however exist. This, for instance, does not mean an organization should stick to “continuity” when the continuity means continuing corrupt practices. In such a case, the continuity militates against unlearning lousy behavior and inhibits new ways of doing things.
At any rate, continuity only works when the person(s) appointed to bridge the institutional knowledge gap have the right competences.
In MEC’s case, I posit that the unfortunate retention of Jean Mathanga and Linda Kunje is nothing short of an act of sabotage and that were this idea championed by any party other than DPP, the word Peter Mutharika would have used is “treason”.
I will however stick to sabotage.
Look at it this way: like with everything to do with the fresh presidential election, DPP wants to sabotage the new commissioners’ determination to succeed where former commissioners, disastrously led by Justice Jane Ansah, failed.
Listening to the interviews of both Jean Mathanga and Linda Kunje disgracing Parliament’s Public Appointments Committee (PAC) the other day, it was clear that these two were significant problems in the May 2019 election.
Uncooperative, evasive, taking themselves as mini gods that can make or unmake parliamentarians, refusing to be held accountable, incapable of providing lucid responses to simple questions.
I could go on and on.
All the above are undesirable competences. They are not characteristics of truthful and trustworthy people who can conduct free, fair, and credible elections.
As you all know, even before the two presented themselves to Parliament, the High Court had on February 3, 2020 duly conferred certificates of incompetence to them and their friends; a certification which was upheld if not upgraded by the highest court in the land.
Today, whenever I see these former now continuing commissioners, I take it that I am looking at publicly certified incompetents (PCIs).
It boggles the mind therefore how DPP decided that of all the DPP members, PCIs are its best contribution to the fresh election.
If this is what putting the best foot forward is in DPP’s philosophy, then I fear for Malawi because whether governing or in opposition, Malawi needs political parties capable of identifying and deploying their best talents.
Having said that, on behalf of the entire Talking Blues community, I heartily welcome Justice Chifundo Kachale.
The more astute of you will remember his name from the never-ending R v Bakili Muluzi & another, aka the MK1.7 billion case.
Based on his cool, calm, and collected chairing over that case, this far, I have only respect for the new MEC chairperson.
I hope he will make my respect last and if humanly possible, double it.
The first problem I see is that DPP has given him a poisoned chalice by soiling his commission with PCIs.
His second problem is the MEC Secretariat. Established to attend to administrative matters and support the Commissioners, it is filled to the brim with dubious characters.
For a start, the Chief Elections Officer Mr Sam Alfandika is on record for failing to provide answers to simple questions. Now, for a CEO to fail to give clear and coherent answers is unacceptable anywhere.
In court Blues Orators it means he is hiding something. Why? Because he is either afraid of self-incrimination or he wishes to protect someone, in return for something.
This is the feeling everyone got when watching Mr Alfandika giving something akin to testimony in the Constitutional Court.
With his behavior, would I allow Mr Alfandika to conduct elections at my mphakati (Church community)? Over my dead body.
Would you?
I will, therefore, be astonished if Justice Kachale fails to use his powers as Chairperson to immediately ensure that Alfandika is told in no uncertain terms to stay as far away as practically possible from anything to do with the June 23 election and indeed shown the exit door.
Save for exercising his right to vote, Alfandika should not be allowed to linger in the vicinity of MEC or at any polling station or near any electoral premises.
Only if Justice Kachale’s wants his hitherto unblemished CV to start collecting mud will he allow himself to wallow with pigs.
To put it in plain words: Honorable Justice Kachale, fire Mr Alfandika yesterday!
This is not to imply that save for Alfandika, everyone else at MEC is perfect, no. There are plenty of wolves in wolfskins at MEC. At various levels and grades. In many departments. Including criminals who for a price, will sell any election without a care.
For now, however, it is enough to send Mr Alfandika back to the labour office; the rest will be dealt with once a commission of enquiry is conducted to establish what exactly:
• Has led to Malawi taxpayers paying twice to elect a president.
• Contributed to the ill-advised decision to appeal and hire SA lawyers at an extortionate price; and
• Has robbed MEC all vestiges of credibility when MEC is supposed to carry the sacred duty akin to that of the Biblical Samuel in the days of old.
Talking of Prophet Samuel, imagine if you will that he was some compromised character, suspected of bribe-taking and a slothful fellow whose every undertaking was costing the people double or triple as much.
Further, suppose this character could not provide straight answers to the simplest of questions without copiously sweating. Would anyone has taken him seriously?
Would you have taken him seriously?
If your answer is No, then. • Why is Sam Alfandika still at the MEC? • What are we paying him for? • Whose interests is he serving? • When is the new Chairperson firing him?
I, therefore, reiterate that Mr Sam Alfandika must be fired or asked to resign with effect from last week. Yesterday is not soon enough if Malawians are to trust the outcome of June 23.
By the way, could someone let Mr Sangwani Mwafulirwa know that we are still waiting for a lucid explanation on why he couldn’t notify stakeholders in time that the plane carrying some voting materials from China would arrive earlier than scheduled?
Please also advise Mr Sangwani Mwafulirwa to inform the new Chairperson that this shady way of doing things is yet another reason why Alfandika needed to go, by last week.
BLANTYRE-(MaraviPost)—Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC) has downplayed queries that were raised by the opposition Malawi Congress Party (MCP) in regards to registration process.
MCP, through its head of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Daudi Suleiman, alleged that some people voted in 2019 election though they were not on the voters’ register of the electoral body.
The party alleged that some people believed to be supporters of Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) were allowed to register multiple times in an attempt to increase the votes for the DPP’s torchbearer President Peter Mutharika.
Responding, during a press briefing which was jointly held with the National Registration Bureau (NRB), MEC’s Chief Elections Officer Sam Alfandika said what the opposition parties alleged is impractical in as far the MEC’s voters register database is concerned.
“The system will not allow multiple registrations on the same kit. Someone may register multiple times in different centres and phases but these entries will be caught when all their information is deposited into the main database and exception reports will be printed. Only the first registration is valid,” said Alfandika.
On allegation that one National ID number was assigned to multiple voters in MEC database, Alfandika said in that circumstance one person will be allowed to vote.
“It must be noted that the Commission scans either the National ID or the NRB registration receipt sticker when registering voters.
“Even if two or more people were to share the same National ID number or same registration receipt number only the first registration will be recognized in the voter Register while any subsequent voter registrations with that number will be sent into the exceptions file,” he said.
He added: “NRB had a lot of cases where the registration officers during ID mass registration and ID registration during voter registration made mistakes when registering the people e.g on gender, names e.t.c. A number of people have come back to request NRB to edit details after they had already registered for voting.
“This was mainly after the ID cards had been printed and distributed to them, way after voter registration exercise. In such instances the same person might have different details on their new National ID as compared to what is in the voters’ register.”
On the issue 33, 523 people with NRB receipts and MEC receipts without National IDS, the electoral body’s CEO conceded to have that anomaly because initially MEC and NRB were operating offline.
“An ID number is issued only after all the validation checks have been carried out successfully. Therefore, those records that have failed validation checks for various reasons e.g duplicates will have no ID allocated. During the voter registration exercise in 2018, the NRB and MEC Biometric Registration Kits (BRKs) were operating in offline mode with receipts being issued without validating with the Central System. When the records in the BRKs were synced with the server and processed, and those that failed the validation checks were not issued with National IDs,” he said.
Taking his turn, Director of National Registration Bureau (NRB) Mackford Somanje had once again refuted rumours that minors might have been registered during the first and second phase of Malawi Electoral Commission MEC Voter and Verification exercise.
Somanje said the body has instituted independent investigations into allegations that minors might have registered during the voter registration by the MEC.
He, however, has acknowledged that in their system there are people whose dates of birth date back to the 1800s.
Somanje said those people had their details verified by the bureau and found that they were eligible to register and get a national identification card.
He has also indicated that it is not possible for its database to be cleaned or audited by any individual or institution as it is against the act that guides its operations.
Recently, MCP demanded auditing of voters rolls of Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC) and data based on National Registration Bureau (NRB) alleging that it is being tampered with ahead of July 2 fresh presidential elections.
BLANTYRE-(MaraviPost)-Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC) will hold fresh nominations papers presentation in Nkhotakota central constituency following the sudden death of as aspirant Andrew Mlotha.
In press statement released on Monday, April 22 signed by Sam Alfandika, MEC’s Chief Election Officer disclosed that proceedings in relation to Parliamentary Elections in Nkhotakota Central Constituency have been stopped.
Alfandika added that there will be fresh nominations to be received by the Constituency Returning Officer, on 29th April 2019 from 8 am to 4pm;
Below is the full MEC statement;
MALAWI ELECTORAL COMMISSION DEATH OF A CANDIDATE [section 47 of the Parliamentary and Presidential Elections Act] Take notice that pursuant to section 47 of the Parliamentary and Presidential Elections Act, I hereby give notice of death of MR ANDREW MLOTHA, a Parliamentary candidate for Nkhotakota Central Constituency who died on Monday, 22nd April 2019 at Daeyang Hospital in Lilongwe.
Following his death, I declare that:
1. All proceedings in relation to Parliamentary Elections in Nkhotakota Central Constituency have been stopped;
2. All nominations that were done in Nkhotakota Central Constituency are void;
3. There will be fresh nominations to be received by the Constituency Returning Officer, on 29th April 2019 from 8 am to 4pm;
4. All Parliamentary candidates for Nkhotakota Central Constituency who already submitted nomination papers and were declared duly nominated will have just to confirm in writing to the Constituency Returning Officer their intention to still to participate in the Parliamentary Elections and not submit fresh nomination papers;
5. Nomination papers for those who wish to contest for the Parliamentary Elections will be available from the office of the Constituency Returning Officer for Nkhotakota Central from 25th April 2019.
Take notice further that Parliamentary Elections in the constituency will still be held on 21st May 2019. Dated this 22nd April 2019.
Sam Alfandika CHIEF ELECTIONS OFFICER
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