The High Court in Lilongwe has, for the first time, heard the election petition in which DPP candidate Edward Mvoliwa and UTM’s Loveness Gondwe are jointly challenging the Malawi Electoral Commission’s (MEC) declaration of Nancy Tembo as the duly elected Member of Parliament for Ngwenya Constituency.
The court has set 11 December 2025 for its ruling, a date that could prove decisive in the fiercely contested poll.
Presiding Judge Mzonde Mvula directed both the petitioners and MEC to file Word document versions, rather than scanned copies, of sworn statements and skeleton arguments from their witnesses.
He ordered that all documents be submitted by close of business on Friday, stressing the need for timely preparation of the judgment, which will be delivered at 10 a.m. on the appointed date.
Mvoliwa and Gondwe are seeking the nullification of the parliamentary results, arguing that the election was compromised by what they describe as serious irregularities that allegedly favoured MCP candidate Nancy Tembo.
During the hearing, the court was told that the petitioners were dissatisfied with how voting was managed, how ballot boxes were transported, and how votes were counted.
Their submissions claim that some of their party monitors were assaulted and that unidentified individuals later ferried ballot materials to the tally centre without authorization.
They further alleged that some ballot boxes arrived unsealed and that Tembo’s camp had as many as five monitors present, more than double the two allowed by law, potentially influencing the final tally.
MEC’s lawyers rejected the accusations as immaterial, arguing that even if such incidents had occurred, they would not have altered the election’s outcome.
They insisted that the poll was conducted in line with established procedures and that the declared result should be upheld.
Speaking after the hearing, the petitioners’ lawyer, Chimwemwe Sikwese of Sikwese & Co., said he was confident in the case presented, noting that all required evidence had been filed in hard copy.
He added that the court’s request for electronic versions was purely to facilitate the judge’s preparation of the final ruling, which both sides now await.
