LILONGWE, Sept. 5 (Xinhua) -- The Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC) has announced that it has entered into a resource-sharing agreement with the Electoral Commission of Zambia (ECZ) ahead of the September 2025 general elections.
The MEC made the announcement Wednesday in a statement signed by the electoral body's Director of Media and Public Relations, Sangwani Mwafulirwa. According to the agreement, the MEC will borrow a total of 1,500 electricity generators from the ECZ for supplementary use during voter registration for the 2025 general elections.
The statement said the arrangement has been made to ensure that the MEC has the backup power capacity to conduct voter registration without any disruptions.
According to the statement, the MEC requires a total of 2,945 generators to carry out voter registration exercises for the 2025 general elections and, currently, the commission has 1,445 generators in stock, leaving a deficit of 1,500 generators to be sourced.
The MEC further said that the borrowed generators from the ECZ are expected to arrive in Malawi next week.
Resource-sharing among electoral management bodies is a common practice and key objective of the Electoral Commissions Forum of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) Countries, to which both the MEC and the ECZ are members, according to the statement.
In 2014, the MEC also borrowed gas lamps and tents from the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission for the tripartite elections held that year. Similarly, in 2020, the ECZ borrowed 2,200 generators from the MEC for use during voter registration for Zambia's 2021 general elections. ■
