Law professor says Malawi election case needs MEC chair Ansah testimony
A prominent law professor says the Constitutional Court needed the Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC) chair Jane Ansah , a judge of the Malawi Supreme Court of Appeal, to testify in the ongoing election case to make up for the missing puzzle.
South Africa-based Danwood Chirwa says the MEC chief executive officer Sam Alufandika can only explain procedures and processes of conducting an election.
“He cannot speak about the decisions of the commissioners and the chair. So the court will not have any evidence of what was in the minds of the commissioners when they made the determinations on complaints and declared the results, what they knew and what they did not know at the time,” writes Chirwa on Facebook.
Turning to Alufandika’s cross examination on Thursday, Chirwa said the MEC CEO was highly evasive as a witness.
“This was his major weakness. If the election has to be held, he needed to take the court into his confidence by showing that all was above board, and that includes showing that he, as the custodian of the electoral process, is a man of integrity, and understands the electoral process and the fundamental principles and values that underpin Malawi’s democratic system,” says Chirwa.
Chirwa says Alufandika found it difficult to answer questions, even the most mundane and simple, directly and wasted a lot of court’s time.
“This has called his credibility into question, and with it the entire presidential election,” Chirwa writes.
Chirwa says Alufandika seems to have laid out the respondent’s case by admitting that there was considerable use of tippex which was not supplied by MEC to alter results, of duplicate copies of result forms and irregular forms.
“Nevertheless, these questionable results were used to determine the winner of the presidential election after some degrees of vetting; the vetting consisted in verifying what was on the hand written results sheets, whether altered or not, but not after the counting; if monitors did not question the altered results, unsigned results recorded on irregular forms, MEC accepted whatever was submitted to it,” he says.
Chirwa says the court will have to think about the implications of accepting the extent of the irregularities revealed in the case as the norm of constitutionalism and democratic governance.
“So far, the cross examination has established that many alterations were made at the constituency tally centres.
“If this is the case, the petitioners will have established a connection between Suleman’s theory of ghosts in the RMS who manipulated the results and the alterations occurring at the tally centres, away from monitors,” he says.
On Friday Senior Counsel Mordecai Msisha representing Malawi Congress Party (MCP) president, Lazarus Chakwera, took over cross-examining Alfandika.
Msisha began by asking Alfandika whether or not the Commission met to resolve some of the queries that were brought before it.
Alfandika has told the court that commissioners met and resolved to send a fact-finding mission to some areas to establish where tippex came from. This was in response to Counsel Msisha’s question on whether MEC resolved queries brought before the announcement of results.
Msisha further asked Alfandika whether or not the commission had minutes on the meetings and on how commissioners resolved the matter after noting a widespread use of the correction fluid.
Alfandika said there were minutes written but he said he did not use the minutes to back up his sworn statement because he did not see it necessary.
Court adjourned on Friday midday and Alufandika is back in the witness box Monday morning when Msisha will continue cross–examination.
UTM Party president Saulos Chilima and Chakwera are seeking nullification of the presidential election results on the basis that there were irregularities, especially the results management system, that they believed compromised the outcome.
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if the man sweated what about Ansa? she will what?
She will start her monthly period😂😂😂
she will die of heart attack
Aaaaah pali za utumbukanso apa nanunso mwasowa nkhani eti kodi nkhani imene ili ku court anapititsako ndi atumbuka nanga mec ndi dpp imakataniko ku court ko ndiye poti mtumbuka wapeleka ganizo kuti jane ansah akapita kukalongosola ku court za chisankho ikhake vuto kwainu. Or atumbukawo amadya za dpp mene mukuonela aàaah koma kudana ndi mitundu yaenakwanji ngati kuti mtunduwanu ngoyela khungu mwaina ndinu mwa albino aja akuphedwa ndi adad anu
Deadwood Chirwa is hypnotized by hatred for DPP. Mtumbuka ozikonda
MEC and their sweetie heart DPP were responsible for choosing who to be their witness, in their crooked mind they discussed and agreed that Jane Ansah must not be part and parcel of the 700 plus witnesses, ooh my God.All a long this trickster Jane Ansah has been saying the case is at Court let us wait for the court yet she does not want to avail herself to provide evidence so i pray that opposition lawyers must make a special court request for Jane Ansah’s court appearance.She must be fished out wherever she has been hiding at the tax… Read more »
Stupid chirwa. Do you vote pa nyasalande?
Chilungamo kwa muthu woyipa chimawawa kkkk,walakwanji Danwood,ponena maganizo ake inuyo njenje
Awa anadana ndi DPP kalekale kkk
Talk n talk Somemore…. Things will never change in Malawi. Some one will win and lose in this case but the problems in Malawi are like a hydra, whereby if you cut off one head two more will grow…. They say “change starts with you” so, if people don’t change their ways of thinking how will the country develop?
Can’t the judges subpoena either the chairperson or one of the commissioners to testify? As a refusal to comply is an criminal offence, whoever is subpoenaed has to appear in court or produce a written evidence.
danwood chirwa is a load of rubbish. last time he was celebrating when DPP won but later he praised Sulemani for star perfornance. This time he also has another load of garbish.
I beg you pardon!
Chirwa is a concerned malawi like as all…
Let’s put tribes and regionals aside…
We need to live better like other people outside our countries and that can only happen when Peter muthalika and Dpp are arrested.