In the Malawi elections of 1999, three opposition party supporters sued the Electoral Commission and the publicly-funded Malawi Broadcasting Corporation (MBC) over its practice of broadcasting live presidential election rallies - but not rallies by opposition candidates. The court dismissed the suit against the Electoral Commission (saying that it had done all that it could within its power) but found against the MBC.
The court accepted that there was an 'age-old' tradition of live presidential coverage in Malawi, but found that it was not acceptable in an election campaign to give a certain type of coverage to one candidate - the incumbent - and not others. This was in breach of those provisions of the Communications Act and the electoral law that provided that all political parties and election candidates be given equitable or equal treatment during the campaign period.
'To give live coverage to one party and its candidates is not only in breach of the above Sections but it is also discriminatory,' the court observed. This was in breach of the anti-discrimination provisions in the Constitution. The court concluded:
If campaign messages are broadcast live at a presidential function, then equal treatment means that campaign rallies of other political parties or... other presidential candidates be broadcast live. That would give [them] an opportunity to reply to some of the matters raised. That is what equitable treatment of political parties and elections candidates would entail....[E]qual treatment of all competitors is a component of free and fair elections.121
