Commonwealth Secretariat
  1. Home
  2. What's New
  3. Who We Are
  4. What We Do
    1. Democracy
    2. Economics
    3. Education
    4. Gender
    5. Governance
    6. Health
    7. Human Rights
    8. Law
    9. Small States
    10. Sport
    11. Sustainability
    12. Youth
    13. Millennium Development Goals
    14. Funding
  5. News
    1. Events
    2. News Archive Search
    3. Picture Stories
  6. Media Room
    1. Press Archive Search
    2. Media Contacts
    3. Video
    4. Events
    5. In the Media
    6. Updates
    7. Downloads
  7. Resources
    1. Documents
    2. Image Library
    3. Libary & Archives
    4. Publications
  8. Publications
  9. Employment
  10. FAQs
    1. Acronyms
  11. Contact Us

Malawi Elections 2004 - Departure Statement from the Commonwealth Observer Group

25 May 2004

MalawiDepartureStatementDownload the PDF of the Commonwealth Observer Group Departure Statement

Malawi Election 2004
Voters Malawi Elections 20 May 2004
Malawi Election 2004
COG chair on voting day
Malawi Election 2004

Deployment of COG observers

The following Departure Statement was issued this morning by Justice Joseph Warioba, Chairperson of the Commonwealth Observer Group

When we issued our Interim Statement we said that in arriving at our overall assessment of the electoral process in Malawi we would take a number of factors into account.  We have been doing that over the last three days. We have now completed our Report, which we have signed and will send to the Commonwealth Secretary-General.  He will then forward it to the Head of Government, the Chairman of the Malawi Electoral Commission, the political parties and all Commonwealth governments.  It will then be made public, in printed form and on the Commonwealth web-site.

The conclusion we have reached is that the voters were free to express their wishes on election day itself, but because of the problems with the register, the bias of the state media and the abuse of incumbency, the process prior to election day was unfair. Some of the requirements of the democratic process have been met, but others have not.

We have also made a series of recommendations, which we hope will help for the future.  We will now return to our countries, with fond memories of the people of Malawi and the warm welcome we received here. Each of us will follow developments in this country closely.  We wish the people of Malawi well in all your work to strengthen your democracy.  We hope that our Report will contribute to that effort. As individuals we will do whatever we can to help.  We know that the Commonwealth as a whole will do so too.

 25 May 2004

Links of interest

Share this page
About this