MEC asks court to delay documents filing, wants 14 more days in elections case
Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC) has applied to the Constitutional Court in Lilongwe to delay the pollster legal team filing and serving of defense documents.
The court ordered the MEC defense team to submit its defense documents to the Malawi Congress Party (MCP) and UTM lawyers 11 days ago.
But the MEC lawyers said they need the two-week extension to collect witness statements as the evidence in the elections case.
The MEC legal team led by private practice lawyer Tamanda Chokhotho, said the compilation of the defense documents was disrupted by some people who threatened to deal with the legal team who were meeting presiding officers of the just ended controversial May 21 elections.
The lawyers cited as an example calls by the Malawi Congress Party (MCP) publicity secretary Maurice Munthali whom they accuse of inciting people to deal with the MEC legal team who were meeting the presiding officers.
The pollster legal team has since applied to the court to force MCP to withdraw Munthali’s statement which asked people to be vigilant when the MEC officials visit their areas.
Lawyer for MCP Larry Nita said the opposition legal team has received the application from the MEC lawyers to extend time for the service of the defense documents.
“They want the extension of time for the extension of the sworn affidavits but they have already extended the time,” said Nita.
But both MCP and UTM’s Legal team said the MEC application was baseless and they will challenge it in court Monday afternoon, arguing granting more MEC time for soliciting information will mean delaying trial of the case .
In the case, UTM Party president Saulos Chilima and MCP leader Lazarus Chakwera are seeking nullification of the presidential results over alleged irregularities.
MEC declared Mutharika of Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) winner of the presidential race in the May 21 Tripartite Elections, with 1 940 709 votes. He was trailed by Malawi Congress Party (MCP) president Lazarus Chakwera with 1 781 740 votes.
Follow and Subscribe Nyasa TV :
I thought its MEC guys who could have on the front pushing the court to finalise everything, because what I believe with the little knowledge I have is that their chairperson had collected all the necessary information by announcing the May 21 elections. If not , my question is where did they got the results they declared DDP a winner?
I have never been to a law school but MECs legal team leaves a lot to be desired, it’s pathetic.
MECs argument for extension for filing is laughable …….and I’m not a lawyer
Is the MEC/APM legal team that incompetent? Are they ignorant of what the court asked them? or they have been court with their pants down. All the court asked for was the documents/evidence MEC used to declare the winner which should have been handy, so their argument for extension for filling doe not hold water
Where are the documents which MEC declared the winner???? It’s all people want to know , it’s as simple as that
Justice delayed is justice denied.
MEC must think the judges are stupid
The court did not ask for new evidence. The court asked MEC to submit documents which they used to declare the winner. These documents should have been preserved and easily available to MEC making the after the fact , gathering facts meetings with presiding officers uncalled for.
It seems most of the comments have come from MCP. Looking at the issue soberly, MEC is not saying it doesn’t have the results. But for presiding officers to testify in court as witnesses, they need to sign affidavits. That is what MEC is trying to get. MEC cannot go to court without witnesses, and no one cab a witness without signing an affidavit.
If MEC is looking for presiding officers to testify in court as witnesses why not just submit their names in the documents ordered by court.??????????????
You are soooo naive, this has nothing to do with why they failed to present the document as reguested by the court . Again the court did not ask for witnesses rather the documents which MEC used to declare the winner period!!!
Dude, get your facts right! First of all you do not need to sign an affidavit to be s witness and the court did not ask for witnesses it asked for documents
A Jane Ansah mukuti ndinu supreme court judge ndiye court likuti mutulutse degree yanu aione a court ndiye mungati akuidikireni mukasainetse kaye kwa a principle anu ku college munakaphunzirayo? Tulutsani ma form onse amene anasainidwa kale ndi ma auditor mumawayamikira aja mai, mukufuna ma presiding officers pomwe muli ndi audited reports ndiye dziko liti limapanga zimenezo?
mmesa mene munkaulutsa zotsatira za president yu rushed ndiye pano muziti khoti ikudikireni zopusa
Palibe zachamba zoonjezela nthawi,mmesa munayendetsa bwino zisankho and muli ndi zonse zoyenela? Court ndinu amalawi osalola zopusa.We need the country to move forward osati zotayitsa nthawi inu muzikhuta mimba zanu noooooo
Didn’t they have all the information when they declared the election results? Should we say they lied to the Nation i.e the results were bogus, in favour of APM?
By the way, at 75% vote count Chakwera had scored 1.2million, APM 1.4million and Chilima 0.6millio.
At 100% vote count APM scored 1.9million, Chakwera 1.7million and Chilima 1.1million; or figures to that effect.
Incredible isn’t it that all candidates scored and additional 0.5millon votes. Wam’sala anaona nkhondo. Ask Kasambara Ralph.
1.2 million +0.5 milliom = 1.7 million for Chakwera; 1.4 million +0.5 million = 1.9 million for Mutharika; 0.6 million + 0.5 million = 1.1 million. What a bent, bent means evil in this case – mathematician thought that this would help as there shall no change in the results. They erred as here is very clearly that the probability or chance that this case would occur is very small in the same mathematics – its called probability under statistics.
Kokakoka…
Za ziiiiiiii…………… ma results ndiye kuthamanga kuulutsa anzanu atapereka madando u cared less, why do you need an extension now??? mxiiiiiiew!
Kapena ma judge achite kukhala mbulanda ndipamene a MEC muzamve kuti zowonjezera nthawi anakana. Kodi mwayesa ku khoti ndikopangira masanje eti?
i don’t understand why MEC is acting in a childish way. They released the results to declare APM a winner,why not giving the same documents. They said they have sorted everything,why now???? Ngati munathandira kubera Mulungu simunthu,zonse ziziwika ndithu.
MEC needs to act truthfully. I remember watching on television Dr Jane Ansah telling a journalist that she printed results from the computers to compare the results from one area the journalist queried that the figures were not matching. Dr Jane Ansah asked the journalist to state what figures he had and she read the figures she had printed from the computers which showed that the figures were the same. I watched some people clapping hands showing that MEC had all the information at its figure tips and had audacity of printing the same when the whole nation ( at least those with TVs – others listening on radio – and were listening) was watching. What is difficult in 11 days to give this information to those who asked as evidence in court? Let alone why visit villages to ask those people who had completed their job and surrendered their information. MEC is just demonstrating that they lied to the Malawians that they did a good job in the past elections. Its a shame that they are treating Malawians in this way. MEC ( we can even change its name) needs overhaul including the laws and regulations that guide it needs revisions as it has betrayed the people it has pretended to serve. Its acting suspiciously.
The way I understand it, the main rigging occurred towards the end and mostly only regarding presidential results. The example you’re quoting happened during nthawi ya chilungamo before the devil took over.
If the Judges remains the same that ruled against MEC’s application to extend the period, then am sure this application will yield nothing.
By the way, why is MEC panicking? I thought they have the result sheets that they used to declare Mutharika winner in a free and fair election as they claimed?
Its not going to work as we are against time. The truth must come out.
sindidziwa za malamulo, ngakhale kwa nyakwawa ichi nchibwana zedi. Ndatuluka mDPP, I withdraw my support with immediate effect.
zimenezo ndiye zaku mac***** mwamva amec mukaniza kuti khoti izidikira zopusa zanuzo idiot
The constitutional court rejected the same application on the 4th July on the grounds that the application was ill conceived, and that the documents sought by the 2nd petitioner were authored by the 2nd respondent, therefore, there was no need to ask for an extension of the time. In other words, the court was puzzled as to why should MEC ask for an extension of time to gather the requested documents yet the same MEC is the custodian of the same documents.
The 2nd petitioner did not ask for witness statements from MEC, so why should MEC labour itself in gathering statements that were not requested. And again, who permitted MEC to go and obtain the statements beyond the 11 days that was ordered by the constitution court because we all know that the extension of 11 day period was rejected. Here it looks as if MEC wants to tell the judges on how this case should be handled.
You seem to know this things, are you one of counsel? I like your arguments.