IEBC: Okoa Kenya referendum initiative does not meet constitutional requirement

The Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) says the Okoa Kenya referendum initiative does not meet constitutional requirement of 1 million signatures.

This was declared during the IEBC plenary meeting held on 22nd March 2016 on the verification of signatures of registered voters in support of the proposed constitutional amendment presented by Okoa Kenya initiative.

The analysis of the data presented by the Okoa Kenya referendum popular initiative has shown that that the number of valid registered voters supporting the initiative is 891,598. This falls short of the one million registered voters required by law.

Article 257(4) of the Constitution states that: The promoters of a popular initiative shall deliver the draft Bill and the supporting signatures to the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission, which shall verify that the initiative is supported by at least one million registered voters.

“The Commission wishes to declare that the OKOA Kenya proposal to amend the constitution initiative has collapsed by operation of the law.”