IEBC replies to National Super Alliance on its demands

The electoral agency on Tuesday conceded to some demands by National Super Alliance (NASA), including access to the election servers.

Besides agreeing to allow presidential candidates’ agents to access the servers, the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) in its reply agreed to give the GPS locations for all the polling stations and the number of people who vote in the stations.

“The commission concurs with this request (NASA access to the servers). Appropriate access to the electoral technologies will be granted to the presidential candidates’ agents or representatives within the existing laws and commission’s security policies,” the reply by IEBC Chairman Wafula Chebukati to NASA’s letter read in part.

The agency also agreed to have all the forms transmitted simultaneously with the keyed-in results. This time, according to the IEBC, the name of the polling station will also be displayed.

Although NASA roped in Safaricom in its list of the firms that were allegedly involved in bungling elections, it did not make any demand on it.

The commission, however, disagreed on the demand to drop the election technology provider Safran and OT-Morpho and the Dubai-based Al Ghurair, the ballots printer. 

• .

  Keep Reading

• 
  Bill on IEBC to be ready next week, says Parliament
• 
  How Kenyans faked themselves into employment
• 
  IEBC to ODM: Our hands are tied over deputy governor post
• 
  This is the right time for Kenya to fix its broken electoral system

Submit evidence

According to the commission, the Opposition did not submit evidence to show how the two companies were complacent in their contracts.

It also declined to hire a fresh team of 290 returning officers, saying there is no time to train them for the repeat election.

Instead, IEBC offered to use its permanent staff as returning officers (ROs) in order to ensure that they are accountable.

“Due to limited time, the commission will not be able to recruit, train and deploy but will use its permanent employees as ROs for accountability purposes,” the reply addressed to NASA executive director Norman Magaya also read.

The IEBC also refused to fire its top officials, among them the chief executive officer  Ezra Chiloba, saying none of them was found to have committed any criminal acts.