Netherlands Institute for Multiparty Democracy

A. Background

Since 1993 Malawians have shown enthusiasm about elections. In terms of voting behaviour, Malawians like to exercise their rights to choose their political leaders and political system. Hence voter turnout (as expressed as a percent of registered voters) increased from 69 percent in the 1993 referendum to 94 percent in the parliamentary and presidential elections of 1999. However, in the 2004 elections there was a drastic drop in voter turn-out from 94% to 63%. This drop has been a matter of concern and this study was prompted by this trend.

B. The Objectives of the Study
NICE commissioned this study to attempt to find an answer to non-voting behaviour in the country. This study was also expected to help the Malawi Electoral Commission to become more proficient in promoting and nurturing participatory democracy in which voter turn-out remains high. Consequently, the main objectives of the survey were to: i) Understand the reasons why a significant percentage of the electorate failed to vote in the 2004 Presidential and Parliamentary Elections (PPE); and ii) Recommend appropriate strategies for overcoming non-voting. C. Methodology of the study MEC decided to go a more difficult but in the end more promising route of conducting a survey by exclusively interviewing non-voters. Tracing and interviewing actual nonvoters
would have been easier if MEC had up-to-date lists of those registered voters who actually cast their votes. As this was not the case, MEC had to go another way of identifying non-voters, which involved using the country-wide network of the National Initiative for Civic Education (NICE). With the help of NICE it was possible to individually identify and interview a sufficiently large and statistically representative number of non-voters through a series of village meetings.
While developing the questionnaire it became evident that the non-voters would have to be differentiated in four sub-groups and some questions would have to be asked specifically for each sub-group. The four sub-groups identified were:

People who decided not to vote at all.

People who tried to register but failed and were thus prevented from voting.

People who decided after registration not to vote.

People who registered but then failed to cast their vote.

D. Findings of the study
i) Are Malawians indifferent to voting?
The results show that of the sample of 2,897 respondents, 33% did not want to vote at all while the large majority (67%) wanted to vote but failed to do so for one reason or another. Hence Malawians are not indifferent to voting.
ii) Why did some people not want to vote all? A large majority (79%) of those who did not want to vote did so because they were dissatisfied either with delivery of campaign promises or inter-party politics which did not see their candidates selected as candidates. A significant minority (13%) did not vote due to religious reasons. Another group (4%) did not want to vote because they did not know the importance of voting and the rest were busy, sick or away from the country.

iii) Why did some people fail to register?
The problems mentioned by the respondents included lack of registration materials, missing information (e.g. registration cards, voters name, picture, etc.), registration staff unable to process transfer or issue a duplicate certificate, voter being turned back by the registration staff as ineligible, or due to the fact that registration process was tiresome and confusing. Close to two in every ten respondents (17%) failed due to being intimidated by others; or that their registration card was snatched by traditional/political leader; or
registration certificate was bought by someone. Another 11% failed because either they were ill themselves or were attending to a patient.

iv) Why did some people change their minds?
The survey shows that of the 2,897 non-voters, 1,330 or approximately 46% registered but failed to vote. Of these 704 or 24% changed their minds and decided not to vote. The study was designed to get information on such non-voters regarding their decision not to vote. A large majority (60%) of the non-voters cited the political system as the main culprit for their change of mind at the last minute. Approximately 32% said they were generally dissatisfied with the performance of elected leaders and that they feel
cheated by their MPs. Twenty-eight percent (28%) cited diminishing confidence in elected leaders and pointed out that they have no confidence in election outcomes because people vote for parties not personalities.

v) What prevented some people from voting?
The results of this survey have shown that some of the non-voters actually registered and had all the intentions to go to the polls on the polling day. A good percentage (36%) failed due to poor health. Another 20% did not vote because they lost the registration certificate. Furthermore, 20% said that there was neither assistance nor encouragement from polling staff or that they were turned back by polling staff as ineligible. A further 12% failed due to intimidation by political leaders or party members. Eleven percent was
not able to vote because they were way.

vi) Did people know enough about the elections?
Virtually everyone (99%) knew about the May 20 elections in 2004. Furthermore, 95% of those interviewed said they had access to information concerning the elections. This result shows that none of the people interviewed could have failed to vote on account of ignorance of the elections. Furthermore, only a small percentage of people could have failed due to lack of information.

vii) Did religion affect voting behaviour?
We wanted to know the extent to which religion might have played a role in people’s decisions not to vote. In terms of religion Christians and Moslems dominated the sample. Other religions were extremely low in the sample.
Nonetheless we note more Christians claimed that they did not want to vote at all than Moslems (34% vs. 27%). In terms of those who registered but were prevented from voting, more Moslems claimed to have been prevented from voting compared to Christians.

viii) Did gender affect voting behaviour?
Contrary to common sense, a higher percentage of men (37% male vs. 29% female) did not register to vote because they did not want to vote at all. On the other hand, in term of registration, a slightly higher proportion of women (23% compared to 19% men) failed to register. Similarly, significantly more women (26% vs. 18% men) who registered were prevented from voting.

ix) Did ethnicity affect voting behaviour? In terms of those non-voters who wanted to vote but failed to register, the results show that:

• The Tongas met the greatest challenge in trying to register. Most of those who failed to register failed due to no registration materials or were turned back by the registration staff as ineligible.

• There are those who registered but later decided not to vote. The Chewa, Yao
and Ngoni slightly dominated this category and reasons were mostly to do with
diminishing confidence in the political system and imposition of candidates.

• Lastly, there were those that were prevented from voting. The results show that the Nkhonde (32%), Tumbuka and Yao (27%) were most disadvantaged in this respect.

• The Nkhondes failed mostly due to loss of registration certificate. On the other hand the Yao and Tumbuka were prevented mostly by illnesses.

x) What were the major key findings on election civic education in the 2004
PPE?
Key findings on civic education indicate serious shortfalls in a number of areas. These include the fact that major issues are not covered by civic education messages; the fact that political parties dominate civic education meetings; the fact that the electorate, by far, prefer the radio as a source of election information and the fact that a majority of the electorate did not attend civic education meetings in the 2004 PPE.

xi) What type of information was disseminated and through what means?

• Eighty-eight percent (88%) mentioned the radio as their source of information for the elections. The radio was therefore the most common means of
communication about the elections.

• A large majority (72%) attended civic education meetings organized by political parties. The National Initiative for Civic Education (NICE) came second with 33% of the respondents attending their meetings. Only 16% of the respondents mentioned having attended a civic education meeting organized by MEC. PAC and the traditional leaders were mentioned by 11% and 10% respectively.

• It is also important to note that political leaders, religious organisation, NGOs and friends also played important roles. Political leaders were mentioned by 38% of the non-voters whereas 20% mentioned religious organisations, 18.5% NGOs and 17% friends.

• In terms of the preferred source of information, the majority (66%) of the
respondents, by far, preferred the radio.

• A significant minority (29%) of the respondents who did not vote did not receive information on the registration process.

• Information on other processes of the elections was not available to majority of the respondents. For instance, 59% claimed that they had no information on the polling process. Information on the campaign and nomination processes was received by a mere 27% and 17% respectively. Furthermore, only one in five Malawians had information on voter rights