Confusion, disarray within IEBC as election day draws near

IEBC Chairman Wafula Chebukati and CEO Ezra Chiloba

Recent happenings portray a commission shaken by the Supreme Court and infiltrated to the core by insidious operatives from both sides of the political divide.

Like the mythical Tower of Babel, Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) is in  utter confusion and complete disarray with just 37 days remaining before it conducts a repeat presidential elections.

Investigations by Saturday Standard have revealed a commission shaken by the Supreme Court decision, infiltrated to the core by insidious operatives and officials pushed to the wall by diverse and competing interests.

It is the story of a powerful secretariat propped up by a forceful state and opposition machinery, a weak commission working at cross purposes within itself to maintain a semblance of constitutional independence in the face of damning revelations.

 The leaked memo from Chairman Wafula Chebukati to CEO Ezra Chiloba is but a mere tip of the iceberg. Beneath is a divided house of officials pigeonholed into disparate camps, doing bidding for different masters but all purporting to work for a common purpose.

So much so that by last night, the commissioners and a section of top secretariat officials, all supposedly independent, had been placed under 24-hour surveillance by the National Intelligence Service (NIS).

“Their movements, calls and interactions are being closely monitored,” a source told Saturday Standard.

The surveillance followed claims and counterclaims by Jubilee and NASA leadership that various camps at the IEBC have been holding clandestine meetings. One of the commissioners said to be allied to Opposition NASA has categorically denied participating in the rendezvous.

Temporary reprieve

Sobriety appeared to have returned at the commission yesterday, temporarily perhaps.  A meeting held yesterday involving the commissioners and CEO ignored the events of the last few days and instead dwelt on the preparedness of the commission to undertake the October 17 repeat poll. The meeting, we learnt, was cool, went on smoothly and all commissioners who were in attendance including Chebukati consulted each other and jointly agreed on to send out to the public in form of a press statement.

After the meeting, the chairman is reported to have tasked Chiloba to put together the press statement.

Sources who spoke on condition of anonymity say the chairman appeared to have swallowed up his own pronouncements on a special “project team” he had appointed on Tuesday to run the repeat election. The “project team”  headed by Marjan Hassan Marjan as coordinator isolates Chiloba and a team of other senior officers from the management of the election. It has since been opposed by President Uhuru Kenyatta’s Jubilee party and Raila Odinga’s NASA.

“As a matter of fact, at the end of our meeting, the chairman himself gestured to the CEO who is also the secretary of the commission and asked him to prepare a public communication on our deliberations,” a commissioner who attended the meeting said.

Chiloba himself appears to have ignored Chebukati’s pronouncements on special project team as well as the contents of the hard-hitting memo which has embarrassed the commission. On Wednesday, and in defiance to the project team, Chiloba sent out a memo to all county election managers guiding them on recruitment of election officials.

“You are required to refer to the database of election officials engaged for the August 8 General Election and engage officials whose performance was satisfactory. In addition, confirm their availability for the fresh election,” Chiloba wrote in an internal memo.

Thursday’s leaked memo and its aftermath, it is said, served to expose the frailties of the commission to the outside world. Before that, a reported near-fistfight between Chebukati and ICT Director James Muhati over creation of covert username in his name had been denied by the commission. While Chebukati’s memo was detailed to a fault, indicting the whole edifice, revealing fresh unknowns and querying what he himself had answered in his replying affidavit to the petition, the commissioners response was not any better.

In utter contradiction, it denied the issues raised while at the same time saying the secretariat was compiling responses. Further, it misspelled the names of Vice Chairman Consolata Nkatha Maina and Commissioner Margaret Wanjala.

In the end, the commission ended up looking rudderless in the face of an upcoming repeat elections and without the option of replacing them. Further, a game of musical chairs ensued with a section of commissioners withdrawing their names from the statement and later, reportedly under duress or threats, recanting the said withdrawals.

An industrial suit lodged by the Kenya Independent Commission Workers Union on the same day further aggravated the situation. The suit drafted to the benefit of Chiloba, Immaculate Kassait, James Muhati, Betty Nyabuto, Praxedes Tororey and Moses Kipkogey aimed to suspend, temporarily, an impeding disciplinary action against them but was denied by the court. Chebukati also denied involvement.

Yesterday, Chebukati through his lawyers Iseme Kamau & Maseme Advocates issued an ultimatum to the union and its advocates to correct the public impression that the CEO had instructed them.

“Confirm in writing that the our client has never instructed you in relation to this matter or any other matter, immediately issue unqualified apology to our client for the unauthorised use of his name and withdraw all references to our client in the suit,” the demand letter by lawyer Kamau Karori reads.

In the letter, Chiloba also demanded the amended suit and publication of the apology in the first four pages of the Standard and Nation publication within 48 hours.

Extremist positions

Chiloba’s letter came as it emerged that the lack of harmony within the commission is its bane.

“We adopt a resolution. When we step out, some of us received instructions on phone and immediately retract their earlier position. This impasse is not good. It’s like we are getting instructions externally,” complained a commissioner.

The grandstanding within the commission has been further exacerbated by the extremist positions adopted by the two main political groupings -- Jubilee and NASA. While the latter is opposed to the October 17 election date, the former is opposed to Chebukati’s “project team.”

The inflows of these extremist positions have been filtering into the commission and its decision making structures leading to the confusion emanating from Anniversary Towers. Further, the pressure put on the commissioners from emissaries of the two political groupings has exposed their soft underbelly.

It is said that some of been issued with direct threats on call, text or verbally. A well-structured online bullying of some of the commissioners entailing propaganda and false messaging has also thrown the commission off-balance.

Some commissioners also confirmed by last night that they were under duress to resign while security for some of them had been scaled down to their shock.