Handouts regulations ready in weeks
Politicians will soon stop coercing prospective voters with freebies, especially cash, or risk jail as regulations to govern the prohibition of handouts under the Political Parties Act (PPA) of 2018 will be laid before the 51st Session of Parliament set to open on February 14 2025.
The regulations, currently being developed by a team called Reference Group led by the Registrar of Political Parties Kizito Tenthani, are expected to be completed in the next two weeks before validation of the draft with civil society and political parties.

Others in the team are Lawrence Lunguzi from Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC), Liness Chikankheni (Ministry of Justice), Joseph Chintolo (Registrar General), McHarven Ngwata (Malawi Law Society) and Joseph Chunga (Political Science Association).
In an interview yesterday, Tenthani said they expect to finalise the drafts of the regulations and submit them to the Ministry of Justice for processing by the end of February.
He said, thereafter, the regulations will be presented to the Minister of Justice to publish in the gazette.
Said Tenthani: “My expectation is that we will be able to lay the regulations before Parliament within the budget sitting. The issue of handouts is an area where you definitely need regulations so that people understand what exactly handouts are within the confines of the law.
“It is a mandatory legislative process because the regulations are a form of law called subordinate legislation. Usually they [parliamentarians] do not debate them, even if they do, they cannot change.”
MLS president Patrick Mpaka confirmed the need to lay the regulations before Parliament, saying “that one is a legal requirement under the Constitution that subsidiary legislation must be laid before Parliament.”
Section 58 of the Constitution reads: “Parliament may, with respect to any particular Act of Parliament, delegate to the Executive or to the Judiciary the power to make subsidiary legislation within the specification and for the purposes laid out in that Act and any subsidiary legislation so made shall be laid before Parliament in accordance with its Standing Orders.”
Already, National Planning Commission (NPC) public relations and communications manager Thom Khanje has called for urgent enforcement of the PPA, saying the culture of handouts is still persistent as the country gears up for the September General Election.
In an interview yesterday, Khanje said NPC has established through its engagement with various stakeholders that the distribution of handouts continues ahead of the elections, an act which is also against the spirit of the Malawi 2063 (MW2063) agenda.
“The message we are getting on the ground is that the distribution of handouts continues this year as we approach the elections. We are just raising concern that these issues are also in the MW2063 under mindset change.
“One of the reasons we keep on electing non performing leaders, including legislators, councillors is the distribution of handouts. It should be one of the issues that must be addressed, including enforcement of the Act,” he said.
On his part, National Initiative for Civic Education (Nice) Trust executive director Gray Kalindekafe warned that time to enforce the law was running out.
He said: “The law has been in place since 2018 and it is unfortunate that up to now, there are no regulations in place. We are running out of time. The elections are in six months.
“If regulations are still not in place, when are they going to be implemented? After elections?”
Asked whether his office has capacity to oversee implementation of the regulations since he recently said the office needed setting up, Tenthani, who assumed office in April 2024, said people should not expect that everything will be up and running from the first day.
“We are working towards implementing the Act, given the time and resources available. We are prioritising some things to address the urgent requirements.
“We can’t do everything all at once, because setting up an office is a long term effort. The problem I see is that you people are looking at this office in terms of elections. Most of the provisions of the Act are relevant outside elections,” he argued.
Almost seven years after its enactment, the Act remains toothless, crippled by the absence of regulations, enabling politicians to evade accountability and transparency.
Section 41 (1) of the PPA 2018 prohibits any candidate, political party or person contesting in an election from issuing handouts.
Under Subsection (3) of the same section, a person who contravenes Subsection (1) commits an offence, and shall, upon conviction, be liable to a fine of K10 million and five years imprisonment.