Uncertainty looms over fate of waiting card holders

By Felix Olick and Wainaina Ndungu

NAIROBI; KENYA: Confusion reigned over the use of waiting cards to register as voters with the Government and the electoral commission apparently reading from different scripts.

This even as top Government leaders called for a massive last-minute effort to boost voter registration efforts and ordinary wananchi piled on the pressure.

With just three days to go, the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) maintained that Kenyans would only be permitted to use the document after the President assented to the amended Election Act.

“The Bill has not been enacted into law by the President,” said IEBC Chairman Issack Hassan. “So we have not been able to advise our clerks to accept those with waiting slips because we are waiting for confirmation.”

However, at the time of going to press, President Kibaki was yet to assent to the Bill that would allow approximately 300,000 Kenyans holding waiting slips to register as voters for next year’s polls.

On Thursday, Prime Minister Raila Odinga assured the public that the President would assent to the Bill immediately to allow more Kenyans to register. But yesterday, State House explained that they were not to blame for the delay saying that the Bill was only passed by Parliament on Thursday evening.

“Parliament passed the Bill yesterday (Thursday) at 5.30pm and they have not forwarded the amendments to the AG’s office for onward transmission to the President,” read a statement sent to The Standard On Saturday by head of Presidential Press Service Isaiah Kabira.

The use of waiting cards would be controversial with fears they could lead to voter fraud. IEBC have expressed reservations over the use of the temporary documents and have written to Attorney General Githu Muigai on their misgivings. Hassan indicated that even the Registrar of Persons have backed their opposition but noted that they would have no option but to comply with the law if Kibaki signs it.

According to IEBC, waiting cards are not authentic documents since they have no serial numbers or photos. They also argue that Biometric Voter Registration kits, could only accept ID card or passport numbers adding that in order to key in the waiting card numbers, their technicians will be required to reconfigure the machines, a process that takes time.

Meanwhile, the IEBC has clarified that voters are free to register anywhere they wished to in the country. In wake of claims by various politicians that they could be victims of voter importation, the IEBC Upper Central (Nyeri) coordinator Patrick Odame said it will be hard to prove this allegation after new elections rules left it open for Kenyans to register anywhere they wished.

“Even if you took people to court, it will be upon the said “victims” to say they were being forced to register where they did not wish to register,” said Odame.

Among those who have raised charges of voters of voter importation is outgoing Maragua MP Elias Mbau who has claimed that voters in his area were being transported to register in Thika town constituency.

“We cannot a low this miscarriage of democracy to continue unabated,” Mbau said recently.

And during the Jamhuri Day Cerebrations in Nyahururu town, outgoing Ol-Kalou MP Erastus Mureithi and women leader Faith Gitau raised alarm that voters were being imported from other counties to the area. The two alleged that the voters were being transported from the nearby Laikipia and Nakuru counties to the newly created Ol Jororok constituency by a parliamentary aspirant in the area.

Mureithi said that it was unfair that the people from Karandi in Laikipia were being transported in buses to register in Ol-Jororok constituency against the electoral rules.

Nyandarua west DC Paul Famba warned that stiff action would be taken against those who would be found engaging in the act.

“It is a crime to ferry voters from one region to another for political gains. My office has received the claims and I promise that action will be taken,” he said during this year’s Jamhuri day celebrations in Ol Jororok town. Last week in Kiambu County, a DO spearheaded the arrest of a busload of residents heading for the registration exercise in Dagoretti North constituency.