Bagus defeats MP Maliro, Mia go unopposed: PP primaries Chikhwawa
People Party (PP) National Organizing Secretary, Salim Bagus outclassed parliamentarian Benadertta Mlaka Maliro during the party primary elections for Chikhwawa Central which were held on Sunday.
Official results revealed that Bagus amassed 7721 votes against Mlaka Maliro’s 2982 votes.
In an interview after the primary elections, Bagus said he would engage the second gear to make sure that he should win as Member of Parliament (MP) for the area.
He also urged the loser Benadertta Mlaka Maliro to accept the results as he said the primary elections were an in-house thing aimed at strengthening the party.
“Mlaka Maliro needs to accept because all the results have been signed by both monitors and presiding officers,” said Bagus.
“I would like to appeal to PP members to tighten the party after primary elections because we are one family and to do better during the forthcoming tripartite elections we need to unite and make sure that President Joyce Banda and her MP wins during the May 20 tripartite elections,” he said.
The former lawmaker said he would continue from where he left when he was the parliamentarian for the constituency 10 years ago.
“I will be engaging with the voters to hear from them what kind of developments does they need in their respective areas,” he said.
But Mlaka Maliro is challenging the results as she is claiming that there were some irregularities in some centres.
“The elections were not free and fair, for instance at first I was told that the polls will have three presiding officer at each centre but I was surprised to hear from some presiding officers that they have been chased,” she claimed.
She continued to say that they have evidence of rigging hence they have lodged a complaint to the returning officer.
Asked if she is going to stand as an independent candidate, Maliro said party’s stand on the matter would determine her political future.
“Right now I will be waiting for the party’s action on the matter after that it’s when I can announce whether I will stand as an independent candidate or not. This is not my first time to loss primaries, in 2009 I experienced the same in DPP but sail through during the real elections,” she said.
Retuning Officer for the elections, Yusuf Matumula who is also PP Deputy Treasurer General said all complaints would be submitted to the party secretariat for further scrutiny.
“I have no overall power to act immediately on the complaint from Mlaka Maliro, its only party secretariat which can act on the matter,” he said.
Buy Matumula dismissed rigging claims as unfounded.
In Chikhwawa North, Joseph Tembo emerged the winner with 1936 votes, Rebecca Khembo got 1480 and Tushere Iron collects 671 votes while John Zingale triumphed with 7026 votes against Elijah Simbi’s 2390 votes.
Chikhwawa Mkombezi incumbent parliamentarian Sidik Mia went unopposed as well as PP shadow Member of Parliament for Chikhwawa South Ilyas Karim.
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