Malawi, a land-locked southeast African country, is poised for change of guard with Peter Mutharika, brother of former president Bingu wa Mutharika, and a former foreign minister, winning the presidential polls.
After an aggressively protested election, the Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC) May 31 declared Mutharika as the winner and new president after a clear ruling from the country’s High Court. Mutharika, the leader of the Democratic Progressive Party, obtained 36.4% of the total vote.
Mutharika is known for his expertise in international law and has handled important ministerial portfolios, including foreign affairs and education.
The election results were vigorously contested by the outgoing president Joyce Banda, the first female president of Malawi, who came to power after the death of Bingu wa Mutharika two years ago. Banda came in third with 20.2% of the vote. However, she later accepted the verdict and congratulated the new president-elect.
The 54-nation African Union has rejected the charges of rigging and said that the voting was conducted in a “largely transparent manner.”
Banda’s tenure was marked by some pioneering experiments in governance to lift the fortunes of Malawi’s predominantly agriculture-based economy, but got shadowed by a festering $30 million corruption scandal dubbed “cashgate,” which led donors to cut aid, a big blow to a country that depends on foreign aid for 40% of the country’s budget.
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