Mudavadi alleges Jubilee plot to lock out 'hostile' voters

Amani National Congress (ANC) leader Musalia Mudavadi addresses Party delegates of Kakamega County at Masinde Muliro University of Science and Technology on January 23, 2016.Mudavadi said Jubilee government have started rigging 2017 elections. BY BENJAMIN SAKWA.

Jubilee has technically started to rig 2017 elections using its majority in Parliament and the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC), Amani National Congress (ANC) party leader Musalia Mudavadi has claimed.

Speaking in Kakamega yesterday, Mudavadi said the timeframe allocated for voter registration was impractical because the IEBC lacked funds.

“Regions supporting Jubilee have already reached maximum percentage in voter registration while western lags behind at 40 per cent. There are more than 800,000 people without IDs in western and IEBC cannot fool anyone that it will register them at the faraway ward level with two staff and one kit,” said Mudavadi as he called for allocation of more resources in areas with many unregistered voters.

He claimed that under-funding IEBC was a deliberate scheme by Jubilee to lock out voters in ‘hostile’ zones.

“Jubilee has conspired with the National Assembly to deny the IEBC Sh20 billion requested to fund operations. It has instead given it (IEBC) a meagre Sh500 million for voter registration to justify voter apathy,” he claimed.

“The amount can hardly meet the budget for IEBC staff allowances let alone the transport and other logistics. This is a mockery, Jubilee is courting trouble and planting seeds for chaos in order to stay in office beyond 2017.”

Mudavadi met about 800 ANC Kakamega County delegates at Masinde Muliro University after making stopovers in Kakamega town to address residents.

He also called on residents to come and register as voters. “Rise up and shame the devil,” Mudavadi said.

“I am shocked that as at November last year only 2,000 people applied for IDs in Sabatia but only 310 have been issued with the document while 334 lie uncollected. Why can’t the registrars of persons find these applicants?” he posed.

Mudavadi at the same time took a swipe at CORD and Jubilee on the fate of Mumias Sugar.

He claimed that MPs allied to both coalitions have deliberately blocked debate on “the crisis facing the sugarcane industry in Kenya” report lying in Parliament which he believes has measures to revive the sugar industry.

“The report contains startling revelations of how financiers of Jubilee and CORD, perpetrators of graft and abuse of office, led to the meltdown in sugar industry,” he claimed.

 

Report adopted

He nonetheless asked MPs allied to Jubilee from the region to champion the revival of Mumias Sugar in an apparent attack at MPs elected on his former UDF party Emmanuel Wangwe (Navakholo), Bernard Shinali (Ikolomani) and Benjamin Washiali (Mumias East).

“Now that they are in Jubilee by consent they should invoke the tyranny of numbers to get the report adopted immediately Parliament reopens in February. We stand with the six million sugarcane farmers in the country,” said Mudavadi.

Other ANC leaders at the meeting Alfred Agoi (Sabatia), Alfred Sambu (Webuye East) and John Bunyasi (Nambale) urged the Jubilee administration to implement the recommended Sugar Industry Strategic agenda for competitiveness in the sector.

ANC national chair Kelvin Lunani said they would soon launch campaigns to popularise the party in western on Wednesday.

At the same time Mr Lunani asked Kenyans to remain strong in the face of the Al-Shabaab attack on KDF in Somalia last week.