IEBC clarifies on Kalonzo Musyoka ID mix-up

NAIROBI, KENYA: The Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) has promised to act on CORD Co-principal Kalonzo Musyoka's identity card mix-up.

Kalonzo on Wednesday while verifying his voter details in Wajir discovered that he shares the same identity card (ID) number with Salome Wanjiru Njoroge who was born in 1993.

But IEBC has promised to address the anomaly. "Our attention is drawn to the reports that Kalonzo and Wanjiru are registered as voters under the same ID number," said Andrew Limo, the electoral body's communication manager.

He said the commission is establishing the circumstances under which this mix up occurred.

"It is worth noting that there are several cases of shared ID numbers in the register of voters' database. In most cases, this could be because of data entry errors at the point of registration or genuine sharing of ID numbers. The commission has been in touch with the National Registration Bureau on potential national ID duplicates," Limo said.

He assured the public that since voters are identified using biometric features on voting day, no legitimately registered voters can be disenfranchised.

"In addition, any person whose national ID details are inconsistent with the details captured in the biometric system, such a person is never allowed to vote," he said.

Limo clarified that the law provides for correction of errors during the inspection of the register. "There will be a month long period to inspect the register after the voter registration exercise is complete and the records captured are consolidated," he said.

The commission also informed the public that it will suspend the SMS query code 22464 which it piloted to help identify errors.