MCP to win in 2025, says President Chakwera
The Malawi Congress Party (MCP) ended its three-day convention with President Lazarus Chakwera declaring, “we are winning next year’s elections!”
This forced delegates in the jam-packed Bingu International Convention Centre auditorium in Lilongwe to give the President a standing ovation.
Chakwera, who the convention endorsed as MCP torch-bearer in the 2025 Presidential Election, talked little about policy.
Instead, he pinned his focus on urging delegates to strengthen the party at all levels.
Said Chakwera: “You need to start working tirelessly to mobilise support at grassroots level so that people can join us and also register to vote.”
Chakwera also said MCP’s primary elections should be conducted in a free and fair manner if the party is to feature the right candidates.
One thing was clear though as the party ended the indaba: The battle for executive positions divided the party and it will take more than rhetoric to rebuild it into one cohesive team.
But the new national executive committee (NEC), which was unveiled yesterday, seems to know that a lot needs to be done to heal the divisions.
“We need to unite now. To those that have won, let us celebrate with honour,” pleaded Richard Chimwendo Banda, the newly elected MCP secretary general (SG) in his acceptance speech.
The convention’s steering committee chairperson Kezzie Msukwa said signs of unity were visible at the convention, observing that the major casualties were present during the closing ceremony.
At this point, he recognised the presence of NEC aspirants Vitumbiko Mumba, Ken Zikhale Ng’oma and Simplex Chithyola Banda, among others.
But conspicuously missing at the closing ceremony was the party’s immediate-past SG Eisenhower Mkaka.
Msukwa acknowledged that the campaign was rough, saying that is normal in political campaigns.
He said: “Sometimes you mention words that ordinarily you shouldn’t have said. We must not pretend, where there is a political campaign it is always dirty despite that we had a code of conduct,” he said.
The Chitipa East lawmaker, who himself lost in the first deputy president race, further revealed that the candidates underwent psychological and spiritual therapy before the elections, which he believed will fasten the healing process.
When asked if the therapy benefited him, he said with a smile: “It did. I lost honourably. And, I am happy that I lost.”
During the closing ceremony, the Malawi Electoral Commission confirmed winners of 20 NEC positions with Speaker of Parliament Catherine Gotani Hara installed as first deputy president
