Mutharika trying to remain in power by ‘hook or crook’ – Malawi opposition

The opposition Malawi Congress Party (MCP) and UTM Party alliance and its partners   has claimed that  President Peter Mutharika was trying to stay in power by ‘hook or crook’ and to do so the Malawi leader  was stooping to any level.

UTM spokesperson Joseph Chidanti Malunga said at a news conference in Lilongwe reading a prepared statement from the MCP-UTM alliance and its partners.

Malunga said Mutharika was taking Malawians for granted and politics to gutter level just to remain in power.

“Fellow Malawians, if you ever doubted Prof Mutharika’s resolve to remain in power by hook or crook, through legal or illegal means, his recent actions must have erased any such doubt.

“His order for the arrest of the leaders of the Human Rights Defenders Coalition is one example. His clandestine meeting with shady characters from the Middle East is another,” said Malunga.

Malunga also branded as “arrogant” President Mutharika’s decision to withheld assent to four election-related bills that Parliament sent for his nod last month; and that he would not fire Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC) commissioners who the Constitutional Court (ConCourt), presiding over the presidential election dispute, found to be incompetent and ordered Parliament’s Public Appointments Committee (PAC) to further assess their fitness. The committee recommended that they be sacked.

He also accused Mutharika of “unlawful attempts” to extend “tribal influence” to the solemn task of state defence.

University of Malawi’s Chancellor College law lecturer Sunduzwayo Madise  is on record saying Malawi was in a peculiar situation where Mutharika was still exercising full presidential powers despite that the election was nullified, thus ordinarily the President would have had temporary powers.