President Peter Mutharika has described as reasonable the use of correction fluid Tippex in the 2019 elections, an election the opposition are contesting.
Mutharika has made the remark during an interview for the Talk to Aljazeera aired on Sunday.
Asked on how he perceives the election, Mutharika described the election as free and fair arguing the certifications made by the United Nations, European Union and SADC observers were evidence things went well.
He was however quick to describe the current political turmoil and the wave of demonstrations as being the work of his political rivals.
“The opposition decided not to accept the results, it is not like it was nor free and fair. The results come from schools where teachers use Tippex to correct error. However tippex was used to correct normal mathematical errors and it was agreed by monitors from all parties at the centres for the changes to be made,” he said.
Apparently, the use of Tippex is one of the highly contentions that the opposition Malawi Congress Party and the UTM with the call through the Constitutional Court to nullify the results. The case is now still i session.
The Malawi leader has since said that the series of post-election demonstrations including the demand for the resignation of Malawi Electoral Commission Jane Ansah has not disturbed his government’s plans for development.
Mutharika has also claimed that the demonstrations are a political conspiracy against his regime saying the there was a clip that circulated before the elections involving the MCP leader Lazarus Chakwera and Human Rights Defenders Coalition Chair Timothy Mtambo making a conspiracy to cause lawlessness should the MCP lose the poll.
After the elections, the HRDC has been leading the protests against the legitimacy of the elections, a thing Mutharika described as coming from rivals.
Source: MIJ Online.
