NAIROBI: A sustained attack on the credibility and ability of the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) to conduct genuine elections has the potential of ruining peace ahead of the 2017 polls.
Utterances by Opposition MPs early this week to the effect that this country ‘will plunge into chaos’ should the Government not yield to their demands on IEBC-related matters is a threat to national security.
Assertions by a Cord MP on Monday that ‘we turned the other cheek in 2007 and 2013 and we shall not do that again in 2017’ is an apt citation of what incitement can be. As an independent institution, the Opposition must not complaining on everything the commission does as this will create a false alarm among potential voters.
On Monday, Cord MPs demanded the suspension of the mass voter registration set for next month citing the commission’s lack of adequate registration materials. The commission itself, apart from an approval of Sh500 million budget for the exercise against their Sh2 billion budget, hasn’t indicated it is unable to register voters. The commission has averred that it has put in place required logistics for the 24,618 polling centres.
Unless there is something the Opposition knows that we don’t, I believe they are wrong to cite internal challenges facing IEBC in executing its mandate.
These proclamations are self-destructive. My sixth sense nudges me to believe any potential boycott of voter registration will happen in opposition strongholds. Pro-government areas are unlikely to be disenfranchised. The world over, great leaders are known to concede defeat when the figures deny them victory.
Unsubstantiated and somehow outrageous allegations that officers of the National Intelligence Service are being recruited as registration clerks is a recipe to keep potential voters away from registering.
Yet Cord knows it needs to really mobilise its supporters if at all it has dreams of challenging Jubilee’s tyranny of numbers at the ballot. You can never claim to be supportive of fair polls if all you do is paint the referee negatively.
The rigging narrative is not new. In 2002, the then Rainbow Alliance which Cord leader Raila Odinga brought to Narc believed the defunct Electoral Commission of Kenya (ECK) had lived to its billing by overseeing an election where the opposition won.
In 2007, the same people blamed the ECK when the opposition lost to the incumbent government. After their ill-fated 2013 political outing, IEBC was blamed for the loss, even after numbers told ‘the real story of why Jubilee won’.
We cannot afford to sabotage activities of the IEBC just to give an impression that the factors are skewed against certain political players. It would be scandalous for Cord and Jubilee to split their opinion about technical aspects of the electoral process such that Cord would be seen to be against and Jubilee supportive of IEBC.
Yet, I am not saying Cord can’t raise issues related to the process. As an integral player in the next polls, Cord should leave the technical aspects to the experts and concentrate on the political aspects. It would be a great service to this country if Cord was in the forefront drumming up support for registration of as many Kenyans as possible. This would even be more fruitful if their campaign is hinged on registration of persons who left school last year. However, IEBC must not betray Kenyans by carrying out an exercise that casts aspersions on their credibility.
They must bring out the real challenges facing them and seek support from relevant government agencies. The use of technology-driven gadgets must be reviewed to ensure hitches don’t occur as it did in 2013 in some areas.
The voter registration must be extended to all areas without leaving marginalised areas at a disadvantage due to the extra logistical nightmare posed by these areas. Pastoralists and far-flung areas should be accorded extra support and focus, which they rarely get in the voter registration pandemonium experienced just before elections.
It is an opportune time for IEBC to prepare early and instil confidence in all political players that all their operations are being done overboard.