Malawi church leaders say incompetent officials marred elections

Published: 2004-06-01

CAPE TOWN, South Africa (CNS) -- Church leaders blamed incompetent election officials and faulty procedures for the widespread dissatisfaction with Malawi's third multiparty election, won by Bingu wa Mutharika of the ruling United Democratic Front. "The results came in very slowly, and we still don't know what the problem was that made the counting take so long," Archbishop Tarcisius Ziyaye of Blantyre said in a telephone interview. He told Catholic News Service that the results of the May 20 presidential and parliamentary elections were announced late May 23. Mutharika, outgoing President Bakili Muluzi's designated successor, was declared the winner, despite opposition claims that the poll was rigged. "The whole electoral system needs to be revamped," Father Robert Mwaungulu, secretary-general of the Malawi bishops' conference, said in a telephone interview from Lilongwe. The election officers responsible for the poll were "incompetent" and it "took too long to get the results," he said.

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