A court in Blantyre has upheld results of 2019 parliamentary election in Mangochi Monkey-Bay Constituency where Ralph Jooma was declared as the winner.
High Court Judge Jack N’riva has delivered the ruling today.
Jooma (pictured) of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) was declared winner in 2019 but Gerald Kazembe of the Malawi Congress Party (MCP) challenged the result in court claiming that irregularities affected the outcome of the polls. Kazembe wanted the court to nullify Jooma’s victory.
However, N’riva today has upheld the decision by the Malawi Electoral Commission to declare Jooma as the winner. According to N’riva, evidence by all witnesses failed to prove Kazembe’s claims.
Results presented by Malawi Electoral Commission showed that Jooma won the elections with 9,341 votes against Kazembe’s 9,052.
Kazembe has since said that he will file an appeal at the Supreme Court of Appeal.
On his part, Jooma has said the ruling was expected because no complaints about irregularities were recorded in logbooks during the elections.
Results of the 2019 Presidential and Parliamentary elections were heavily contested, with 44 petitions being filed across the country.
The presidential elections were nullified by the Constitutional Court last year. The decision was later upheld by the Supreme Court of Appeal and fresh elections were held in June, 2020.
Since last year, about six 2019 parliamentary election results have been nullified and fresh elections have been held in the affected constituencies.
