Some hitches were recorded yesterday as the first phase of the voter registration for the September 16 2025 General Elections rolled out in 14 councils across the country.
Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC) is conducting the exercise, which will run until November 3, in 75 constituencies and 161 wards in Chitipa, Karonga, Karonga Town and Mzuzu City in the North; Nkhotakota, Ntchisi, Salima and Dedza in the Centre; Balaka, Neno, Machinga, Phalombe, Mulanje and Chiradzulu in the South.
Spot-checks in several centres across the country showed that the process was running smoothly when registration opened at 8am, although there were some glitches. These included a missing polling centre, malfunctioning elections management devices (EMDs), absence of some party monitors, potential voters missing in the National Registration Bureau (NRB) database and overall low turnout.
But, in an interview after inspecting work at some of the centres in Salima, MEC chairperson Annabel Mtalimanja said she was satisfied with progress on the first day. She described the turnout as good and the overall experience as smoother.
“Having visited some of the centres in Salima and getting reports from other districts, we are satisfied with the progress so far. Most of the problems we faced during the pilot registration in September were ironed out,” she said.
School in Mulanje
Mtalimanja said the EMDs the electoral body is using for the first time in the electoral process are “performing optimally, as time taken to help registrants is shorter”.
Yet, as she spoke, at Mchepa centre in Salima North Constituency, potential voters had a rude awakening when there were neither MEC nor NRB staff present. There was absolutely no registration centre staff and equipment.
On the matter, Mtalimanja said: “The centre was gazetted, but unfortunately, our system missed it when we were listing the centres. We, therefore, encourage potential voters to register at the other nearest registration centre.”
While observing the absence of some political party monitors at the centres, she urged parties to make available their monitors at the centres for transparency.
“We wrote all political parties to have monitors at the centres. It is proper that the monitors are present so that the electoral process is conducted in a free, fair and transparent manner,” added Mtalimanja.
The issue of some potential voters being sent back due to lack of the national ID, emanated at Chifunga Primary School Centre in Neno, where centre supervisor Matthias Masina said they had turned back one voter after 40 people—24 of them men—had registered.
“His name was missing in the NRB database. We told him to go to the NRB offices in Mwanza or Neno to register as a citizen. It is only then that we can register him,” said Masina.
The centre is located 25 kilometres from Neno Boma and 45 from Mwanza.
Like in most of the centres countrywide, in Chiradzulu the turnout was low, with most registration centres with very short queues or none at all. For instance, by 12.17pm Goleka Primary School Centre had registered 115 people, while at St Michaels Primary School, 79 people had been registered as of 2.30pm and Chiradzulu Urban Primary School had registered 98 people as of 3pm.
The centres were expected to close at 4pm, and potential voters that came after that time were sent back to return today.
A centre supervisor at the Dedza District Council offices, which had registered less than 100 people on the opening day, Raphael Kajiwa attributed the low turnout to the redemarcation exercise MEC embarked on after consultations with stakeholders preceding the 2019 elections.
After the process, the number of constituencies in the country increased from 193 to 229, while the number of local wards rose from 462 to 503.
Dedza, which previously had eight constituencies, now has nine, with the creation of the Dedza Boma constituency.
“People are shunning the newly-established centre for the ones that existed before the redemarcation. Since this is only the first day, we hope things will turn around in the remaining 13 days,” said Kajiwa.
In an interview, National Initiative for Civic Education (Nice) Trust programme officer Christopher Naphiyo said yesterday they received reports that in some centres, machines were slow, taking between 14 to 17 minutes to register one person.
The second phase of the voter registration exercise will be conducted from November 9 to 22 2024 in 14 councils while the final phase will run from November 28 to December 11 in eight councils.
—Additional reporting by Ralph Mvona, Joshua Gondwe, Brian Chigumula, Lovemore Khomo, Greenwell Kayuni and Haneeph Maulana, Staff Writers.
