UTM has said that the party president Dr Saulos Chilima is not barred by the Constitution to contest as a presidential candidate in the forthcoming 2025 elections.
The party’s spokesperson Felix Njawala told The Times that they have legal advice that Chilima is free to stand.
“Our view, based on the advice of our legal advisers, is that there is no legal bar to Dr Chilima contesting in the 2025 presidential election if he so desires,” he said
He said that the decision for Chilima to contest will be made based on its partnership with the Malawi Congress Party (MCP), following their alliance agreement which he said runs up to 2030.
Vice-President Saulos Chilima’s intent to vie for the presidency in 2025 has revived debate on his eligibility as some legal minds believe President Lazarus Chakwera holds one of his two available options.
The lawyers base their position on a 2009 Constitutional Court ruling on presidential term limits which could stand in Chilima’s way after serving two terms as the country’s Vice-President.
The lawyers said there were two options for Chilima the first being the President moving the Malawi Supreme Court of Appeal to interpret that ConCourt ruling. The second option, others suggested, is for Chilima to submit his nomination papers to the Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC) and thereafter challenge his disqualification in court.
The 2009 judicial review ruling by the ConCourt stipulates that the Constitution limits the President as well as first and second-vice presidents to serve only two five-year consecutive terms. By 2025, Chilima will have served the two terms.
The ConCourt ruling, which followed an application by former president Bakili Muluzi and his United Democratic Front after the MEC rejected his third-term presidential nomination, in its literal interpretation also restrains any presidential candidate from picking a vice-president or second vice-president as their running mate if they served the maximum two terms.
Delivering their judgement on May 16 2009, the three judges, Edward Twea, Healey Potani and Michael Mtambo, took substantial time to interpret tenure of office in the presidency and said the Constitution limits the terms of a person who has served as “President, First Vice- President or Second Vice-President, to a maximum of two consecutive terms”.
The judges said: “Ordinarily, a Vice-President would be eligible to contest for the office of the President when the President’s tenure comes to an end. However, our Constitution bars this. If this were not so, one could, in ascending order, be a second-Vice President, then be a First Vice-President and then the President, or, in descending order, be the President, First Vice -President and then the second Vice-President. This, in effect, would have permitted a person to serve the presidency for 30 years or more.”
Chilima, who joined frontline politics when former president Peter Mutharika named him as his running mate in 2014, has openly stated his ambition to vie for the presidency in 2025.
In the nullified 2019 presidential election, Chilima came third after he polled one million-plus votes with Chakwera’s second and Mutharika first.
