Registrar of Political Parties Kizito Tenthani has disclosed that while five of the six political parties ordered to submit reports on their private funding have complied, most failed to name their donors as required by law.
The development has drawn criticism from governance analysts and legal experts who are demanding immediate sanctions.
The par ties—Al l iance for Democracy (Aford), Malawi Congress Party (MCP), People’s Party (PP), United Democratic Front (UDF),
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and UTM Party—were given until October 31 to declare their donations, with only Aford “completely ignoring the order”, according to Tenthani.
Addressing the press in Lilongwe yesterday, he said a preliminary review of the submitted reports has uncovered several breaches of the Political Parties Act, with the failure to provide a detailed breakdown of contributors emerging as a key violation.
Said Tenthani: “While I commend the political parties for making an effort to comply with the law, our major observation is that most political parties, apart from UDF and People’s Party, all the other political parties have not provided details such as names of people who have made donations.
“They have just acknowledged that they received some donations without giving us a breakdown.”
He also revealed that the governing DPP and MCP submitted their public funding reports with serious irregularities, including mixing of State funds with money from other sources—a direct violation of the Political Parties Act.
From 2019 to 2025, MCP received K430 million in public funding while DPP received K432 million.
The law requires political parties to maintain a dedicated bank account exclusively for public funds, but both parties failed to do this, mixing taxpayer money with donations and other income in a way that compromises financial transparency.
An analysis of the expenditure shows that the parties spent heavily on administrative and staff costs, meaning a large portion of public funds went to operational overheads like salaries, rather than programmatic activities and projects intended for public outreach and party development, as envisioned by the law.
The Political Parties Act, 2018 provides the legal basis for political party financing regulations in Malawi. According to the Act, political parties must maintain separate bank accounts for public and private funding, with Section 28 specifically requiring that “all donations received by the party under Section 27 in the form of money are deposited into a separate bank account
held in the name of the political party”.
The Act also establishes serious penalties for non-compliance. Under Section 27(6), violations in respect to private funding declarations and disclosures are offences attracting a fine equal to the amount of funds or assets undeclared and two years imprisonment.
In an interview yesterday, Malawi Law Society president Davis Njobvu described the situation as unfortunate and that the law needs to take its course.
He said: “The PP Act provides for sanctions and the MLS expects the ORPP to initiate processes with the Secretary to the Treasury [ST] and the Director of Public Prosecutions that will lead to such sanctions being meted out accordingly,
“Under Section 24 of the PP Act, the ORPP can recommend to ST that state funding be suspended where any requirements that pertain to state funding are not complied with. Under Section 27(5) of the PP [Political Parties] Act, the secretaries general of political parties are personally responsible for private funding declarations and disclosures to the ORPP [Office of the Registrar of Political Parties].”
On his part, Centre for Social Accountability and Transparency (Csat) executive director Willy Kambwandira
observed that the revelations expose deep-rooted culture of impunity and total disregard for the Political Parties Act among the country’s major political players.
Human Rights Defenders Coalition chairperson Michael Kaiyatsa expressed similar concerns, noting: “Political parties are not above the law. Their refusal or failure to submit full and transparent financial reports raises concerns about illicit funding sources and the misuse of taxpayer money for partisan gain.”
On his part, governance expert Charles Kajoloweka insisted that non-compliance should be met with full weight of legal sanctions provided under the law, adding that there should be no room for indifference, but the law must be fully enforced.
Despite criticism from analysts, Tenthani indicated he would take a measured approach to enforcement, particularly regarding Aford’s complete non-compliance.
He described the compliance effort as a good start that parties are for the first time interfacing with the law.
The registrar also revealed that his office received 189 complaints about campaign misconduct connected to the September 16 polls.
The vast majori ty—178 complaints—involved the distribution of handouts, with the Central Region being the biggest hotspot. MCP and independent candidates were the most cited, with 58 complaints each, followed by DPP candidates with 41.
However, the office has closed 88 of the cases, with most dismissed because acts like repairing school blocks were not classified as handouts. Only five cases remain under active investigation, with two forwarded to the Director of Public Prosecutions.
