Malawi President Dr. Lazarus Chakwera’s last-ditch attempt to block the
release of presidential election results flopped on Sunday evening, after the
High Court in Lilongwe declined to grant orders halting the declaration.
Chakwera, through his Malawi Congress Party
(MCP), had filed a judicial review petition seeking conservatory orders to stop
the Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC) from announcing results, citing what he
termed “massive irregularities.”
In its ruling issued at 6:50 p.m. Malawian time,
the court allowed the judicial review case to proceed but refused to restrain
MEC from announcing the outcome.
“Application for leave to apply for judicial
review is granted. However, the order restraining the Respondent from declaring
the presidential results is not granted,” the order read in part.
The petition came as interim results showed
Chakwera trailing badly behind his main challenger and former president Peter
Mutharika.
With results from 24 out of 36 electoral councils tallied, Mutharika of the
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) had 2,022,879 votes (65.6%) compared to
Chakwera’s 732,575 votes (23.8%).
Dalitso Kabambe of the UTM was in third with 146,664 votes (4.8%), while
other candidates shared 180,885 votes (5.9%).
Mutharika, 85, now requires fewer than 300,000
votes from the remaining councils to surpass the 50% + 1 threshold needed for
an outright win.
Strikingly, he has outperformed Chakwera in areas traditionally considered
MCP strongholds, including the capital Lilongwe and Nkhotakota.
The MEC confirmed that 4,689,172 Malawians
voted in the September 16 polls, representing a 65.1% turnout, slightly below
the 67% turnout in the 2020 elections.
The comeback bid by Mutharika is remarkable.
Widely written off as a political spent force after the courts nullified his
disputed 2019 re-election due to irregularities, he was defeated in the
court-ordered 2020 rerun by Chakwera, who rose to power on the strength of the
Tonse Alliance.
That coalition, which united former president
Joyce Banda and then-vice president Saulos Chilima, has since disintegrated.
Chilima, once seen as a potential challenger to Chakwera, died in a military
helicopter crash last year, further weakening the alliance’s political
machinery.
MEC is legally required to declare the final
results today, a step that could seal Mutharika’s dramatic return to power five
years after his ouster.
