Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC) chaiperson Annabel Mtalimanja has said an election system audit was partially conducted through issuance of copies of voters’ register to stakeholders for verification.
She said in Mzuzu during a meeting with civil society organisations (CSOs) on election matters that the exercise enabled political parties and other actors to check and verify the names as per their request.
Mtalimanja’s statement comes at a time five opposition political parties submitted a scope for an independent audit of the election management system (EMS) to MEC in May this year, requesting for several issues, including access to the system and the voters’ register, among others.
The scope was collectively submitted by Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), Alliance for Democracy (Aford), People’s Party (PP), United Democratic Front (UDF) and UTM Party.
Responding to queries CSOs raised during the Mzuzu meeting, Mtalimanja, a judge of the High Court of Malawi, said they provided 24 registered political parties with the voters’ register to honour their request of checking and verifying names of the voters in the system.
She said: “In line with Section 20 and 21 of the Presidential, Parliamentary and Local Government Elections Act of 2023 which requires MEC to provide the voters’ register, we issued copies of the same to all 24 registered political parties along with other copies sent to our regional offices.
“To the contrary, none of those political parties has provided feedback regarding their findings on the voters’ register. We assume they did not encounter any anomaly.”
The scope draft, titled ‘Concept note and the scope of independent audit of the Malawi Electoral Commission’s election management systems (EMS)’, also challenged the electoral body’s decision to use Smartmatic as its vendor to manage the September 16 General Election.
Mtalimanja said MEC rejected all other requests because they lacked legal authority and were in direct breach of the commission’s security protocols. She said some of the requests meant the electoral body sharing the system’s source codes to third parties.
High Court of Malawi Judge Chimbizgani Kacheche last week granted DPP and UTM Party along with five other individuals their wish to start judicial review proceedings on their demand for the independent audit of the MEC system.
The claimants also want MEC to stop implementing the use of electronic management devices (EMD) to identify voters and electronic transmission to determine the national results.
In a written response yesterday, DPP secretary general Peter Mukhitho urged Mtalimanja to use her sentiments as court evidence.
“The matter is under judicial review. Let her give that as part of MEC’s submission to the court,” he said.
PP secretary general Ben Chakhame, who is also Centre for Multiparty Democracy chairperson, discredited Mtalimanja’s remarks, saying the audit was never conducted.
On his part, Citizens for Credible Elections leader Sylvester Namiwa maintained that they need an independent audit of MEC’s electoral system.
