Malawi’s High Court rejects President Joyce Banda decision to annul her country’s general election.

27 May 2014 From BusinessDay we learn that Malawi’s High Court has rejected a decision by President Joyce Banda to annul her country’s general election – in which she was a candidate. Ms Banda had decided to annul the elections following complaints of irregularities. She had followed that up with the surprising statement that while a new poll would be held within 90 days, she would not stand in the new elections.

However, the head of the electoral commission has said the president did not have the power to annul the vote. And the High Court has ruled that despite problems involving the electronic count the poll remained valid and vote-counting would go on.

The contested polls had seen Ms Banda’s rival candidate Peter Mutharika take a lead of 42%, with 30% of votes counted while Ms Banda was in second place with 23%, according to the Malawi Electoral Commission.