High Court dismisses election cases against MEC

The High Court sitting in Blantyre on Tuesday, January 19, 2016 has dismissed a case by independent candidate for Limbuli Ward in Mulanje in which he petitioned the court to overturn a determination of the Commission.

Derek Eliya Safari contested in the 2014 Local Government Elections in the ward as an independent candidate, however, he was disqualified after polling had already taken place.

MEC was presented with evidence that Safari was an ex-convict therefore he was not eligible to contest in the first place.

By the time he was disqualified preliminary results had already showed that he was leading in the ward and the Commission declared his runner up as winner in the ward.

Dissatisfied with the decision, Safari petitioned the court to overturn the decision of the Commission and to declare him winner in the Local Government Elections for Limbuli Ward as he was leading in the vote count.

Nyasa Times understands that since filing the petition, Safari has not made any move to have the matter heard and concluded a move that forced MEC lawyers to file for dismissal of the case.

And on Tuesday, Registrar of the High Court, Simeon Mdeza dismissed Safari’s petition on the ground of inordinate and inexcusable delay by him in setting down the matter for hearing.

This development brings to three, the total number of electoral cases that have been dismissed by the High Court in 2016 alone.

On January 12, 2016 the High Court in Lilongwe also dismissed a case in which Anna Mpinda Kankwenda challenged the results of Mchinji North Constituency citing irregularities in the vote counting process.

On the same day the High Court also dismissed a petition by Bertha Zilemba who challenged the results of the 2014 Parliamentary Elections in Kasungu North East constituency citing irregularities in the vote counting process.

During the May 20, 2014 elections, MEC received 360 complaints of which only 26 ended up in court. The rest were resolved through the Complaints Handling Unit of the Commission.

Out of the 26 cases, nine cases have been dismissed with costs in favour of the Malawi Electoral Commission while 10 cases were withdrawn by mutual consent.

Only one case is still in court awaiting judgment and six cases are still in the High Court (2 in Zomba and 4 in Blantyre) waiting for hearing.

There are two 2 cases that are in the Supreme Court of Appeal.

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