Malawi to extend voter registration

An exercise to register up to seven million voters for next year's general election in Malawi is to be extended after being hampered by technical glitches, electoral officials said on Friday.

The phased voter registration, which began in August, was initially due to end on November 29 but a spokesperson for the Malawi electoral commission said it would now not be completed until an as yet to be determined date in December.

"We will be forced to extend registration to sometime in December," Fegus Lipenga, said.

Lipenga said that while 3.5 million people had already been registered, a breakdown of digital cameras used to capture data, including photographs of voters, had slowed down the exercise.

The commission is trying to produce a credible voters roll to avoid the chaos caused ahead of the last election in 2004 when a court-ordered check saw a million names cut from the register.

The May 2009 vote will be the fourth multi-party vote since the end of Kamuzu Banda's dictatorial rule 14 years ago.

Incumbent President Bingu wa Mutharika faces a strong challenge from two key opposition figures: his predecessor and mentor Bakili Muluzi and John Tembo, leader of the Malawi Congress Party