New IEBC chiefs unlikely to live up to public expectations

Pandemonium is defined variously as ‘wild uproar or unrestrained disorder; tumult or chaos’ It’s a word that comes very close to describing the build up to the upcoming General Election. Somehow, we always manage to make a scheduled event that we have had five years to plan ahead for seem like some unforeseen emergency. I am specifically referring to appointment of the election body and its operations once appointed. The United States is having a presidential election early next month. Is it not surprising that while we have heard a lot about the candidates, we are yet to see a single headline about who will run those elections? Similarly, it is possible to follow politics in the UK without ever coming across a reference to the body that oversees elections there. In the context of our politics this is very strange indeed.

It is disturbing that we find need to overhaul our electoral body every election cycle. It is downright depressing that despite all these changes, the problem of rigging does not go away. It is difficult to acquire a conviction that that is about to change. The thinking that we can get angels to head the IEBC who will banish all election malpractices is tempting. If an experiment always gives the same results, it is possible by induction to infer that future similar set ups will yield comparable results.