Atupele rules out electoral alliance: UDF has clear agenda to transform Malawi, he says

UDF presidential candidate, Atupele Muluzi says he will be on the ballot to contest for presidency in the May 20 tripartite elections ruling out the possibility of going into an electoral alliance with other political parties.

Responding to a question on Zodiak Broadcasting Service radio interview aired on Saturday on whether the UDF is considering to team up with others in the election, Atupele said there were no plans regarding an alliance because the UDF party has a clear agenda that will transform the country.

” I will be on the ballot and the issue of an alliance is not our preoccupation at the moment. We have a clear agenda for the country and that is the basis of our participation in the elections,” said the 35 year-old presidential hopeful.

He said the UDF has never had any serious discussion with any political party of a possible alliance and the party is strong enough to win an election.

Atupele: Ready to run for presidency
Atupele: Ready to run for presidency

A political analyst said electoral alliances will be inevitable as the country approaches the May elections.

Mustafa Hussein, a political commentator based at the University of Malawi’s Chancellor College in Zomba, noted that political parties cannot avoid alliances, especially in regions where they are saturated.

In the 2009 elections, DPP rewrote the country’s multiparty political history by sweeping the majority of seats in Parliament with representation across the country, including areas deemed strongholds of other political parties.

Another political science expert from University of Malawi, Nandini Patel, argues that electoral alliances should be formed “as to give adequate time for leadership to consult the rank and file so that lasting alliance strategies are formulated and there is clear understanding both within the party and between the party and its supporters.”

She said at least over two months before the nominations for elections, so that common objectives, policies and strategies are arrived at and adequately discussed and thought through.

Atupele during the interview said as a leader he had achieved a lot on what he had promised to do for the UDF when he had been elected leader of the party.

“I promised to unite UD and the party is now united, I promised to hold a policy conference, the first of its kind and we achieved that. The party is now strong if you compare it with the time before I took over leadership,” said Atupele.

In his acceptance speech soon after being elected at the 2012 National Conference the youthful UDF 2014 torch bearer pledged to foster team work and hardworking spirit at all levels and a code of conduct to ensure discipline at all levels of the party structure.

He told the radio that in his own assessment he has achieved what he promised to achieve to the UDF membership when he was elected as a leader of the party.

The Machinga North East lawmaker said his 10 years’ experience in politics has inspired him to serve the country in a different way and that he is driven by his own principles, saying he should be judged in his own right.

He said all the past leaders including his own father former president Bakili Muluzi had their good and bad sides and that the next UDF government will build on their good sides only.

Malawi Congress Party (MCP) which had an alliance with UDF in the previous elections had also ruled out any electoral pact in the coming elections on the basis that the party could be smeared with current reports of abuse of public funds by the Peoples Party (PP) and its predecessor the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).

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