AG wants DPP to pay K200m

The Office of the Attorney General (AG) is demanding K200 million from the former governing Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) as legal costs in the recent elections case thrown out by the Constitutional Court.

In an interview on Wednesday AG Thabo Chakaka Nyirenda said based on their assessment, they will be demanding K200 million from the DPP.

He said: “This is our estimate, we have not yet filed. The figure that we have come up with is K200 million. We are yet to file it with the court, but this is what we will file with the court.

“On when we will file it, I think as soon as possible because it has taken us time to do an assessment and the like.”

But former AG Charles Mhango, who is one of the lawyers that represented DPP in the case, said in an interview on Wednesday that they were yet to be served.

He said: “Once we are served, we will deal with it as it comes.”

DPP sought the interpretation of the Constitutional Court on the legality of the court-sanctioned Fresh Presidential Election and subsequent parliamentary and local government by-elections presided over by a Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC) cohort that saw four of its members fired by the High Court for not being duly appointed.

The High Court in June this year fired four commissioners Arthur Nanthuru, Steve Duwa, Jean Mathanga and Linda Kunje.

Effectively, the case had the potential to nullify the victory of President Lazarus Chakwera and Vice-President Saulos Chilima if the five-judge panel of the High Court of Malawi sitting as the Constitutional Court granted DPP its wish.

But on November 26, the court dismissed DPP’s application in its entirety at a preliminary stage.

Before the matter went to full hearing, Chakaka-Nyirenda raised preliminary objections, arguing it was a hopeless case and abuse of the court process.

In dismissing the DPP’s application with costs, lead judge Sylvester Kalembera observed that the verdict of the High Court in Lilongwe regarding the composition of MEC held that the conduct of DPP in maintaining more than three names and the appointment of more than three commissioners representing the DPP were illegal.

He said: “The finding principle relief sought by [the DPP], namely nullification of the results of the [fresh presidential election] and subsequent parliamentary and local government by-elections, if granted, would have the effect of benefiting [the DPP] from its own illegality.”

Kalembera said the court findings were that the proceedings were an appeal in disguise or an attempt to re-litigate the issues in the Malawi Congress Party versus the President of the Republic of Malawi on the composition of MEC.

The court further found that DPP lacked standing to approach this court in the manner it did by commencing fresh proceedings, and it dismissed the matter on that premise.

The case was the second in two years to put the country’s presidency on trial in connection with elections. During the first case, Chakwera and Chilima petitioned the court to overturn DPP president Peter Mutharika’s 2019 re-election over alleged irregularities, especially in the results management system. The court ruled in their favour.

However, Mutharika maintains that the judgement was a “judicial coup”.