MEC exposes tippexed poll results in MCP won areas including Chakwera constituency

Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC) is exposing tippexed parliamentary results in areas won by the Malawi Congress Party (MCP) including the constituency which party president Lazarus Chakwera won.

The MCP has been vocal against what they call tippexed results, poll results sheets which were deleted by the correctional fluid, tippex.

The party has since asked the Constitutional Court to order for presidential poll rerun, saying the tippexed results were suspicious.

But the MEC results from the constituencies of Chakwera, secretary general Eisenhower Mkaka, director of youth Richard Chimwendo Banda and party official Sam Kawale, among others, show that tippex was used frequently in the parliamentary poll results sheets.

MCP is not demanding a rerun of the parliamentary poll.

Meanwhile, the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) operatives have described as hypocrisy, that the MCP was demanding for a rerun of the presidential poll because of tippex leaving out the parliamentary poll.

There was no immediate comment from the MCP.

In the case  heard by  the five-judge Constitutional Court panel in Lilongwe,  UTM Party president Saulos Chilima (first petitioner) and Malawi Congress Party (MCP) president Lazarus Chakwera (second petitioner) are seeking nullification of the presidential results in the May 21 2019 Tripartite Elections. President Peter Mutharika, by virtue of being the declared winner, is the first respondent while MEC is the second respondent.

Mutharika has  since filed his response and sworn statements in opposition to Chilima and  Chakwera who cite irregularities, especially in the results management process, as some of the factors justifying nullification of the presidential election.

Through private practice lawyers led by Frank Farouk Mbeta, President Mutharika, a professor at law, is asking the court to dismiss the petitioners’ case.

Mutharika has filed sworn statements in support of his case through the worn statements of Dr. Ben Malunga Phiri (Minister of Local Government), Bob Chimkango a private practice lawyer and more than 50 monitors who witnessed the whole process from voting to counting of the votes in the areas alleged by Chilima and Chakwera to have irregularities.

According to court documents seen by Nyasa Times, President Mutharika discredited the evidence of the petitioners as “lacking and wanting in all material respects.”

According to Mutharika’s response, Chilima and Chakwera have failed in their evidence (sworn statements) to prove the alleged irregularities.

Furthermore, Chilima and Chakwera have failed to show how the alleged irregularities if at all they existed, affected the outcome of the results.