Hiccups are over, get on with registering Kenyans

By Jared Okello

When  Johan Kriegler, retired South African judge, who chaired the Independent Review Commission of Inquiry into the elections of 2007 wound up his mission, he strongly recommended the usage of electronic voting in Kenya’s subsequent polls. Because of the leap it portends for the country’s free and fair elections and the big promise it bears, Kenya had limited choice but to go biometric.

The country has since made great efforts by acquiring fifteen thousand Biometric Voter Registration kits (BVR) from Canadian government to set the tone for next year’s elections.Electronic registration is expected to improve the accuracy of the voters roll by eliminating double registration, registration of minors, and non-citizens and ensure names of dead voters are not on the register.

Ghana acquired thirty thousand kits to register its voters. They took ninety days, targeting 12 million voters but ended up with only 10 million. Kenya has half that number of machines, intends to use a third of Ghana’s duration to register eighteen million voters.Our case obviously has many unforeseen ramifications, some of which could be fatal to the registration exercise. With 1,450 wards, with 290 constituencies, Kenya has 45,000 polling centers demarcated to share 25,000 kits in 30 days.

Essentially one kit will serve three polling stations, some with distances of up to 30km apart. Through solid examination and compelling audits there pulls back the curtain of subtle dangers poised to weaken the registration exercise.

The success calls for divine intervention and a miracle to log on the projected 18 million voters.To this day, however, Kenyans have been treated to incessant interference and epitome of procrastination from political saboteurs particularly with regard to the procurement of these election kits.

At one point, Justice minister Eugene Wamalwa fired salvos at the Treasury as the impediment towards smooth polls. This was due to the unprecedented delays on signing relevant documents for loan facilities to allow French company, Safran Morpho, procure and deliver these gadgets into the country.

The voter registration exercise has begun with trainings having been conducted on the usage of electronic registration kits to the staffers of the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission.  Chairman of the electoral Commission tipped the nation that the kit has a capacity to handle only 50 people in one day.At least one out of three polling stations has a kit. This means that regardless of thousands who are likely to throng these centers to register as voters, only a paltry 50 can be considered.

The expectation from the commission is that Kenyans will be so loyal, so obedient and so patriotic that suffice numerous trips with a date with registration clerks that they will do so religiously till their turn ultimately arrives.

Logical mathematical reasoning also tells the country that at the end of the one-month exercise; only 1,500 voters shall have been registered. Some stations, like those in Juja Constituency where up to over ten thousand voters exist no serious explanation has been provided by IEBC on their plight.

Political obituary

Parliament previously amended the registration period from 60 days to 45 days. For IEBC to unilaterally allocate only 30 days for registration, they are heavily relying on the goodwill of parliamentarians to fast-track clauses that legitimise their self-ordained 30 days.

This stems from the false hope that our members of parliament remain true and committed to their country that they will rush this law in the order paper, do the necessary and sign their early political obituary in the glaring face of an extension of their term in the August house. This is the height and depth of our depravity and the desperation of our need for a just society!

Kenyans believed the new dispensation was going to check the extreme privilege and opulence enjoyed by the political leaders and civil servants at the expense of suffering taxpayers. Kenyans had gotten tired of leaders who perfect fumbling and flailing with matters of national concern.

Also in the queue after the registration will be civic education whose timelines are not clear, notwithstanding blatant failure by parliament to give a clear guideline on attainment of a third representation in parliament by either gender, as is espoused in law.

This can easily precipitate a constitutional crisis in the event this rule is not adhered to. While the brouhaha and uncertainty beckoned, the president met the IEBC commissioners last Wednesday, probably seeking assurances that all would be well. With the pledges, there appeared little to jolt the official launch yesterday and consign any conspiracy by any vested interest that could betray Kenyans’ trust in their government and institutions. 

The writer comments on social and political issues.

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Kriegler BVR