Malawi Congress Party
Encyclopedia
The Malawi Congress Party (MCP) is a political party
Political party
A political party is a political organization that typically seeks to influence government policy, usually by nominating their own candidates and trying to seat them in political office. Parties participate in electoral campaigns, educational outreach or protest actions...

 in Malawi
Malawi
The Republic of Malawi is a landlocked country in southeast Africa that was formerly known as Nyasaland. It is bordered by Zambia to the northwest, Tanzania to the northeast, and Mozambique on the east, south and west. The country is separated from Tanzania and Mozambique by Lake Malawi. Its size...

.
It was the successor to the Nyasaland African Congress
Nyasaland African Congress
The Nyasaland African Congress was an organization that evolved into a political party in Nyasaland during the colonial period. The NAC was suppressed in 1959, but was succeeded in 1960 by the Malawi Congress Party, which went to on decisively win the first universal suffrage elections in 1961,...

 (NAC), which was banned in 1959.
The MCP was founded by Hastings Banda
Hastings Banda
Hastings Kamuzu Banda was the leader of Malawi and its predecessor state, Nyasaland, from 1961 to 1994. After receiving much of his education overseas, Banda returned to his home country to speak against colonialism and advocate for independence...

 and other NAC leaders in 1960.
Hastings Banda became the first MCP president, and later the first president of Malawi.

It won all of the seats in the legislature in the 1961 Nyasaland elections, and led the country to independence as Malawi in 1964. When Malawi became a republic
Republic
A republic is a form of government in which the people, or some significant portion of them, have supreme control over the government and where offices of state are elected or chosen by elected people. In modern times, a common simplified definition of a republic is a government where the head of...

 in 1966, the MCP was formally declared to be the only legal party. All adult citizens were required to be party members. They had to carry "party cards" in their wallets at all times. The MCP lost its monopoly on power in a 1993 referendum, and was roundly defeated in the country's first free elections the next year.

Unlike other former single parties in Africa, the MCP remains a major force in Malawi. It is strongest in the central region populated by ethnic Chewa and Nyanja people.

At the last general elections, held on 19 May 2009, its candidate for president, John Tembo
John Tembo
John Zenus Ungapake Tembo is a Malawian politician and the President of the Malawi Congress Party , the strongest opposition party in Malawi. Tembo comes from the Dedza District in central Malawi, and he is a teacher by profession...

(a longtime confidant of Banda), won 30.7% of the vote, and the party won 26 out of 193 seats.

See also

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