By RAWLINGS OTIENO

Hassan insists that his body conducted a free, fair and transparent election despite challenges

Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) Chairman Issack Hassan was put to task to explain to Kenyans how technology worth billions of shillings failed in last month’s General Election.

The International Centre for Jurist (ICJ) Kenya Chapter told Hassan to make public what went wrong with the electoral systems and gadgets that cost Kenyans a fortune.

ICJ Executive Director George Kegoro tore into the Hassan-led body to stop pressuring Kenyans into accepting the results and move forward for the development of the nation yet answers as to what made the systems fail had not been made public.

“Even as we move on as IEBC wants, we cannot bury our heads in the sand that nothing happened and fail to question the process even when we feel that it was not fair and credible. We must seek for these answers,” said Kegoro.

Kegoro said that the cost of Biometric Voter Registration Kits was worth Sh8 billion; Electronic Voter Identification Device (EVID) cost the tax-payer Sh1.2 billion while Sh85 million was spent on the Electronic Results Transmission system and wants the electoral body to explain to Kenyans the value for their money.

“IEBC cannot continue telling Kenyans that the elections were credible yet these systems that they so much praised failed. The Supreme Court can have their opinion about this but Kenyans must know what happened and get value for their money,” said Kegoro.

Electoral process

The ICJ cast doubt on the electoral process even as Uhuru Kenyatta and his Deputy William Ruto take oath of office in a historic event today at Moi International Sports Centre Kasarani.

Kegoro took Hassan to task to explain how Forms 34 went missing in various polling stations and even if the commission resorted to the use of manual system, there was no control of the results being handled by the presiding officers from the polling stations.

Speaking yesterday during a meeting organised by the Kenya Alliance Residents Association (KARA), Kegoro said that the failure of the electronic results transmission created massive loopholes in the credibility of the tallied presidential results.

On his part, Hassan defended the Commission arguing that they employed three technologies within less than 12 months and should be credited for the work they did as a commission.

He said Kenyans should not be cheated that everything failed in the whole process of elections citing that the Biometric Voter Registration Kits used during voter registration was successful.

“I want Kenyans to know that of all the technology we used the Biometric Voter Registration Kits did not fail,” said Hassan.

The meeting that was attended by human rights activists, civil society members had Hassan hard pressed to tell Kenyans the truth why even after they were advised that the systems would fail they still ignored the advice.

While insisting that the elections were free, fair and transparent, Hassan ignited a bitter exchange with the human rights activists who felt that the anomalies that emerged should not just be ignored.

The electoral body chairman defended their credibility saying that as a commission, they expected more than 500 election petitions but so far only 49 have been filed.

“We as a commission expected to have more than 500 election petition cases, but only 49 have been served upon the commission. This shows how much we tried as a commission,” added Hassan.

Hassan, who was appearing in public for the first time since the declaration of the presidential results, was at pains to explain to the meeting how the credibility of the electoral process could be pegged on the number, or lack thereof of election petitions filed against the IEBC so far.