MCP presents more demands
By Rebecca Chimjeka:
Malawi Congress Party (MCP) has made further demands in relation to the on-going electoral case at the Constitutional Court in Lilongwe where the party, together with UTM, is challenging May 21 presidential election results.
Among the demands, MCP wants Malawi Electoral Commission (Mec) to make available an audit report by a firm that was hired to certify the tripartite elections.
The Daily Times has seen a supplementary sworn statement which MCP has filed in support of an application for the disclosure of the documents.
MCP lawyer Titus Mvalo has signed the statement, which, among other things, wants Mec to make available identities of data entry clerks and their respective bank statements from May 21 to June 29 2019.
“I refer to the sworn statement in support of an application for the disclosure of the documents filed on 7th June 2019, in addition to the documents listed in the application for disclosure. I demand disclosure of following documents for all presidential tally sheets for all the 28 districts from 73 C and original presidential results sheets for all 5,002 polling centres among others,” MCP demands.
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MCP further demands copies of contract documents such as call for expression of interest and bidding that Mec received from all competing firms, notices of award of contract and the signed contract documents from the auditors the commission hired during the elections.
According to the document, Mvalo wants data clerks’ bank statements to ascertain if they were financially influenced to manipulate the elections.
“We are looking for a second respondent’s constituency returning officer and their respective bank statements for the period beginning 1st May, 2019 as it is alleged that they received money to manipulate the elections results in favour of 1st respondent,” Mvalo says.
He says he has come up with the demand after allegations that on or about May 23 2019, a Mec top official told the clerks at Comesa Hall in Blantyre that someone wanted to give them money for lunch and went further to tell them not to bite the hand that fed them.
In the statement, Mvalo says the clerks allegedly received K18 million each through their respective bank accounts.
MCP and UTM are challenging the validity of the election results which indicated that President Peter Mutharika of Democratic Progressive Party was the winner.
The two parties accuse Mec of going ahead to announce the presidential election results despite receiving complaints of irregularities.
High Court judges— Healey Potani, Mike Tembo, Dingiswayo Madise, Ivy Kamanga and Redson Kapindu— are on Wednesday expected to continue hearing preliminary issues of the case.
The first hearing took place on Friday.
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