By Pemphero Malimba:
There are growing fears that many civil society organisations (CSOs) may not take part in civic voter education activities for the September 16, 2025 Local Government, Parliamentary and Presidential Elections as they are yet to get funds for the task, The Daily Times has learned.
This means the CSOs are running out of time, with the elections only four months away.
The Malawi Electoral Commission (Mec) accredited 116 CSOs to carry out civic voter education interventions across the country.
Recently, the Civil Society Elections Integrity Forum (CSEIF) disclosed that the CSOs would need about K30 billion to implement the activities.
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However, according to CSEIF Chairperson Benedicto Kondowe, the CSOs are yet to get the funds.
“So far, only a small fraction of the required K30 billion has been sourced. The balance remains significant, which puts nationwide effective civic and voter education at risk.
“To be honest, I may not know [how much the organisations have mobilised] as organisations get funding differently in the absence of basket funding. But, as things stand, three-quarters of Mec-accredited organisations don’t have sustainable funding,” Kondowe said.
He said the CSOs needed the donor community and other stakeholders to support the cause.
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Kondowe warned that if the situation persisted, polling day would likely be marred by voter apathy and other vices.
“If the funds are not secured, large sections of the population, especially [those] in rural and hard-to-reach areas, will be left uninformed. This could lead to low voter turnout, increased misinformation and a weakened democratic process,” he said.
Asked why the organisations were facing funding woos despite the availability of a United Nations Development Programme-managed basket fund, he said the organisations were not part of CSOs that benefitted from the fund.
“Access to the basket fund is limited to pre-selected partners under a tightly managed framework, leaving many qualified CSOs excluded. Compounding this is the longstanding failure by successive government since 1994 to prioritise and allocate domestic funding for civic and voter education.
“The chronic neglect has forced civil society to rely almost entirely on external support, which is often limited and restrictive,” Kondowe said.
Centre for Multiparty Democracy Executive Director Bonface Chibwana expressed concern over the development.
“It’s a big concern, looking at the information gap that is there and looking at the level of misinformation and disinformation that we have in the country regarding elections. We needed a robust and well funded civil society to bridge that gap and bring clarity on numerous issues that are there to do with elections,” Chibwana said.
He said voter education interventions for the forthcoming elections were supposed to be carried out by various organisations.
“We understand that within the Malawi Electoral Commission, there is a department for civic and voter education but they can’t do it alone. We really need civil society organisations to fill that gap,” Chibwana said.
He said Malawi needed to come up with ways of sourcing adequate funds for civic voter education for elections.
According to Chibwana, funding towards electoral activities has been on the decline in the last three elections.
“We have to see how the civic education aspect can be supported because a lot of partners are shunning that kind of duty and we can’t just delegate it and rely on them,” he said.
Commenting on the development, political and governance analyst George Chaima said there was a need for stakeholders to facilitate resource mobilisation for the CSOs.
“Lack of adequate funding has a negative implication on the process and outcome of election results. Every activity needs funding and the absence of that is a disaster. Equally, Mec depends on its stakeholders to complement the exercise. Mec is limited on its own.
“The role of CSOs is critical in bringing awareness to voters. If the message cannot get to the people on time, then this is another disaster,” Chaima said.
Recently, Mec spokesperson Sangwani Mwafulirwa told the local media that the commission was aware of the financial challenges facing CSOs.
However, Mwafulirwa said the commission does not provide direct funding to the CSOs.
