By Isaac Salima:
The High Court sitting in Blantyre Monday stopped Malawi Congress Party (MCP) regional committees from performing their duties.
This follows an application by one of the party’s members, Lovemore Chauwa, who challenged the committees’ legality, claiming that their term of office had expired.
Judge Allan Muhome granted Chauwa and others the injunction they sought, meaning that, in effect, the court has stopped operations of the party’s six regional committees.
“The committees were elected in 2018 and their five-year term of office expired in 2018. They have been operating illegally, hence the challenge. I am happy that the court has granted our wish and I now hope that the party will hold the elections,” he said.
MCP’s lawyers were not available at the court.
The party’s secretary general Richard Chimwendo Banda was yet to respond to our questionnaire on the issue.
Chauwa and other friends previously challenged the mandate of the committees as well as primary elections.
The members demanded the nullification of results of the primary elections, claiming that they were handled by people who were occupying their office illegally.
But the court dismissed the appeal on technical grounds after agreeing with the defendants that the summons was served late to the court.
However, in the latest application, Chauwa has dropped the challenge on primaries and has since dwelled on the issue of regional committees.
Recently, Chimwendo Banda said the party had tried its best to resort issues that marred primary elections.
