President Lazarus Chakwera on Wednesday applauded Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC) for giving a chance to eligible voters to register for the September 16 2025 General Election but some civil society organisations say they are concerned that many people have been left out.
The third phase of voter registration, which started on November 28 closed on Wednesday in eight councils across the country.
But while delivering his national address on Wednesday night, the President hailed Malawians who turned out to register.
However, Institute for Policy Interaction (IPI) and Centre for Democracy and Elections (Cede) said yesterday that many eligible voters were turned away in all phases of the voter registration due to lack of national identity (ID) cards.
IPI project officer Praise Mwenegamba said: “In many centres, there were no National Registration Bureau (NRB) officials to register people and in some centres network challenges hindered registration of people for IDs.”
In a separate interview, Cede technical specialist Aloisious Nthenda said MEC should extend both the second and third phase of voter registration and work with NRB to ensure that the bureau is present in all centres.
Recently, the Malawi Electoral Support Network said the calls to revisit all the phases are genuine.
Meanwhile, MEC communications officer Richard Mveriwa said yesterday that the commission will issue a statement regarding the voter registration exercise.
In the first and second phases, MEC registered 4 646 902 voters against a projection of 7 386 214 going by National Statistical Office data.
Last month, MEC announced that it will extend the first phase of the voter registration exercise following a High Court ruling that ordered NRB to register individuals without national ID.
