Five lessons from the Malawi miracle. First up and most obvious: opposition unity is essential to defeat ruling parties. If MCP and UTM had cone together earlier they could have won in 2019. See also Gambia, Nigeria: over to you Uganda, Zambia ... 1/5 #MalawiDecides2020 #Malawi

But even a united opposition can be rigged out. The Malawian courts played a massive role by invalidating the 2019 election and insisting on a timely “fresh” poll. But this didn’t just happen: a process of prior reform strengthened judges power + agency 2/5 #MalawiHasDecided

Even with strong courts, bias electoral commissions can lead to a flawed process. It was therefore important that in Malawi the president cannot choose anyone to be head of #MEC but must pick a High Court Judge+so couldn’t appoint a “yes man”. 3/5 #malawinews #MalawiElections

The good performance of MEC - with little money + even less time - shows that many of the logistic + and tallying issues in previous elections were not just about capacity but were also due to a lack of effective leadership + will to deliver clean polls.4/5 #MalawiFreshpoll2020

But even that may not have been enough had the government believed it could retain power through force. It was therefore critical that the military has a history of acting to defend democracy and the rule of law, and was seen to be sympathetic to protestors. /1 more #MalawiVotes

Take home: there is not 1 factor that’s explains the malawi miracle. It took the combination of opposition unity, judicial reform+activism, new MEC leadership+a pro-democratic military - all underpinned by constant pressure from civil society groups @HumanHrdc - to achieve this