Council stops Taekwondo polls

Malawi National Council of Sports (MNCS) executive secretary George Jana has ordered Taekwondo Association of Malawi (TAM) to reorganise their elections within three months due to some electoral flaws.

TAM were expected to hold their elective general assembly at Blantyre Youth Centre (BYC) last weekend but, as the voting process was about to begin, it was noted that some positions to be contested for, in particular those of vice-general secretary and vice-treasurer, were non-existent in their constitution.

“Their [TAM] constitution does not provide for the vice-general secretary and vice-treasurer positions. Therefore, we have ordered the rescheduling of the polls to avoid the confusion that could have emerged from this mess,” said Jana.

“We told them the best way to go was to first amend their constitution to incorporate those positions or first do the elections based on what is provided for in the constitution and do the amendments later. They have chosen the latter and they have to do it within three months.”

TAM president Benedicto Tsinde admitted yesterday that the two positions were indeed unlawful and that they did not properly check what is provided for in their constitution on the inclusion of the unauthorised posts.

“We did not do a thorough check on the flaw before we endorsed the vice-general secretary and vice-treasurer positions. However, this is just a minor anomaly; we will rectify it,” he said.

According to Tsinde, they have since set November 21 as the next date for the rescheduled elective general assembly. TAM has not been conducting elections for the last decade. n