Refugees barred from vote registration

District Commissioner for Balaka James Manyetera says refugees are not eligible to take part in any decision making issues for the country even in polls unless they revoke their status. His remarks comes after one refugee in Balaka, Vincent Mudakenga from Rwanda went to register at one of the centres in the District on September 30, 2008.  

According to the Centre Supervisor of Balaka Community Centre Hall, Patricia Ndau the refugee brought a letter which says he came to Malawi in the year 2000. 

“There was man who came to register and he came with a letter from the immigration department which shows that he came to Malawi in 2000 to seek asylum and apart from that he also came with an ID for the Malawi Government which will expire in 2013,” said Ndau. 

“Since we were not communicated on whether to allow refugee to register or not I referred the matter to the DC’s office who told us that refugees are not allowed to register,” explained Ndau. 

However, Manyetera said the letter that the refugee came with allows them to stay in the refugee camp and not for voting. 

“Yes, the refugee came with a letter  from the immigration office but that letter allows them to stay in the refugee camp not for voting, as long as they come to Malawi as refugees they are foreigners, even for MEC, refugees are not allowed to vote and that’s by constitutional,”  Manyetera said. 

According to chapter VII of the Constitution of the republic of Malawi section 77 subsection 2 “a person shall be qualified to be registered as a voter in a constituency if, and shall not be so qualified unless, at the date of the application for registration that person (a) is a citizen of Malawi or, if not a citizen, has been ordinarily resident in the republic for seven years;(b) has attained the age of eighteen years;(c) and is ordinarily resident in that constituency or was born there or is employed or carries on a business there.”