Malawi police arrest eight over alleged vote rigging in presidential poll

Police in Malawi revealed on Saturday they had arrested eight people following allegations of vote tampering.

The suspects were detained after the Malawi Congress party (MCP) of the outgoing president Lazarus Chakwera said they were suspicious about the way votes were being counted in 13 of the country's 28 districts.

"The MCP has lodged a formal complaint with the Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC) to conduct a physical audit, particularly in areas where we have discovered serious anomalies," said Chakwera's running mate. Vitumbiko Mumba at a press conference.

Police said that eight employees responsible for entering election data had been arrested in the capital Lilongwe on suspicion of manipulating data.

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In a statement, police service spokesperson Peter Kalaya said the arrests followed inquiries into the behaviour of an MEC returning officer for Lilongwe Nkhoma district. 

Kalaya added that police were pursuing similar cases in the districts of Mangochi, Chikwawa, Blantyre, Machinga and Rumphi.

On Thursday, the MEC said it had counted the majority of the votes from Tuesday's poll but has not declared any results.

“The commission will not hurry the results management process just because some political party leaders and candidates are piling up pressure,” said MEC chairperson Justice Annabel Mtalimanja.

She told parties and their candidates to respect the counting procedures.

Chakwera, 70, is seeking a second successive term. The one-time evangelical pastor beat the former law professor Peter Mutharika in 2020 after losing to him in the previous presidential poll in 2014.

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'Media under pressure'

Malawi's main television stations stopped broadcasting live coverage of the general election results, prompting a media advocacy organisation to condemn the pressure being exerted on journalists.

At least four television stations, including the public broadcasterMBC, withdrew without explanation the tables compiling the results they had collected from polling stations.

Golden Matonga, president of MISA Malawi, an organisation that advocates freedom of information, told the French news agency AFP: "The media have been under pressure from various quarters to stop live broadcasts, including the results tables.

"This will create a vacuum. Misinformation can fill that vacuum, and the public may be misinformed."

Malawians not only voted for a president but also for the composition of the parliament and more than 500 local government representatives.

Whoever wins will face the challenge of invigorating an economy that suffers from a lack of foreign currency and inflation.

According to the World Bank, around 70 percent of the 21 million inhabitants live on less than €2 a day.

Chakwera and 85-year-old Mutharika were vying for supremacy in presidential elections in 2019. The then-incumbent Mutharika was declared the winner only for a court to nullify the results months later because of widespread irregularities that included vote tally sheets being altered with correctional fluid.

(With newswires)