Jubilee and CORD leaders have renewed their rivalry over the decision by the outgoing IEBC commissioners to continue handling key logistical preparations for next year's elections.
The political outfits were yesterday divided on the decision by the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) to start the process of sourcing an external firm to audit the voters' register.
Meanwhile, it emerged yesterday that the Election Laws (Amendment) Act – a product of a negotiated deal between CORD and Jubilee on the exit of the commissioners – had left a grey area that the commissioners were exploiting to continue handling preparations for next year's polls against protests by the Opposition.
While the law indicated that the Issack Hassan-led team would exit by September 30, anticipating that by then new commissioners would have been appointed, the same legislation mandated them to "remain in office" until a new team is sworn in.
It is on this strength that the commissioners have continued making preparations for August 8, 2017, polls, recently shortlisting six firms to compete in a tender to audit the register of voters. But CORD protested this move insisting that it is such duties it did not want handled by the current commission.
Read the mood
"In our view, this commission should have left office on September 30. They should have handed over any other responsibility to the secretariat. By them remaining in office to undertake duties that Kenyans had unanimously agreed they could not entrust them to do is failing to read the mood of the country," said ODM Chairman John Mbadi.
CORD Deputy Party Leader Jakoyo Midiwo admitted that it was a mistake not to have indicated in the law that the commissioners leave office immediately the law came into force.
"But even with this lapse in the law, the commissioners' moral conscience should not allow them to be doing things they are doing now. They should have left even before September 30," said the Gem MP.
But Jubilee, through its Majority Leader in the National Assembly Aden Duale, dismissed the protests by CORD insisting that the law required that they remain in office until they hand over to the new team.
"Being in office does not mean them sitting at the basement, it means undertaking duties in preparation for 2017 elections. CORD may wish to make all the noise but that is the law that we passed," said Duale.
Duale sensationally claimed that the plot by the opposition was to ensure the in-coming electoral body delayed in meeting key timelines and thus find ground to call for postponement of elections.
