…Party hopes alliance will lead to election victory
The Malawi Congress Party (MCP) National Executive Committee (NEC) has given party leader Lazarus Chakwera powers to negotiate with UTM president Saulos Chilima over an electoral alliance.
In a statement today, MCP spokesperson Maurice Munthali said the committee passed the resolution at a meeting held on Friday.
According to Munthali, Chakwera has also been given powers to form a team that will hold talks with a UTM team in pursuit of the alliance.
“By implication, the president has been given the mandate to ascertain such terms of an alliance as will be most beneficial for Malawi and its people,” he said.
He added that the MCP NEC is confident that the negotiations with UTM will be conducted in good faith and bear fruits in order to create an alliance that will be voted for by the majority of electorates in the 2020 fresh elections.
Munthali further said that the party believes going into an alliance with Chilima is the best way to harness the gains the two parties cultivated while working together in the elections case.
UTM and MCP were petitioners in the elections case where they worked together in challenging the results of the 2019 Presidential Elections.
Earlier this month, the Constitutional Court nullified the 2019 elections and ordered Malawi Electoral Commission to hold fresh elections.
The court also ruled that the winner in presidential elections should get 50 percent plus one vote of the votes cast, saying this is the true meaning of the term “majority of electorate.
With the UTM and MCP negotiating an alliance, the big question is n who between Chilima and Chakwera will be named the presidential candidate.
The two were both on the ballot in the 2019 presidential elections where Chakwera amassed 1,781,740 votes while Chilima got 1,018,369.
President Peter Mutharika was declared winner with 1,940,709 votes representing 38.57 percent of the total votes cast.
