MCP releases final NEC

Malawi Congress Party (MCP) has released its final national executive committee (NEC) members almost three weeks after its convention in Lilongwe.

During the convention, about 70 percent of the positions were duly elected while 30 percent were filled by endorsement after the party said it wanted equal distribution of seats to make the party national.

After the convention, held from May 11-14, the party left some positions unfilled after resolving that MCP president Lazarus Chakwera would liaise with district chairpersons on how to fill the remaining positions.

In an interview yesterday, MCP secretary general Eisenhower Mkaka confirmed the list of names.

He said: “The president only did 30 percent in consultation with the six regional chairpersons as per convention mandate given to him, while 70 percent were elected at the convention.”

There are almost 79 members in the NEC, including Moses Kunkuyu as campaign director, Titus Mvalo as legal adviser, Hellen Chabunya as director of recruitment and Juliana Lunguzi as a committee member.

In an earlier interview, Chakwera confessed that his party conducted its convention in a hurry after the Supreme Court vacated an injunction their embattled former secretary general Gustave Kaliwo took.

MCP has been in running court battles with Kaliwo and four others whom the party suspended after Kaliwo called for an emergency convention mid last year.

Chakwera obtained a court injunction stopping Kaliwo from holding an emergency convention for the party from July 7 to 9 2017.

Kaliwo, told the media then that he called the convention based on Article 40 of the MCP constitution which states that district committees or the NEC is mandated to call for one.

The case was, however, discontinued in April by Chakwera on the grounds that the matter could better be resolved within the party and not in the courts.

But Kaliwo took yet another injunction at the High Court in Blantyre restraining the party from holding a convention which the party had planned for April 29 2018.

According to a court order signed by Justice Michael Tembo on May 7 2018, the party was not supposed to hold a convention until matters relating to the suspension of Kaliwo and four others (Richard Msowoya, Tony Kandiero, Jessie Kabwila and James Chatonda Kaunda) were resolved.

The court is yet to give its ruling on the inter-partes hearing. n