IEBC report calls for key reforms before next poll

Commissioners Boya Molu (left), Abdi Guliye with Chairman Wafula Chebukati during the launch of IEBC's post-election evaluation report. [Denis Kibuchi, Standard] The Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) is proposing radical measures to improve the electoral process. The recommendations in IEBC's post-election evaluation report, launched on Monday by chairman Wafula Chebukati, calls for review of the law to allow voters to transfer freely to registration centers of their choice. To address the problem that has seen Kenyans travel upcountry to vote, IEBC now wants review of the law to provide guidelines on sources of information for proof of residence of persons applying to transfer and freely pick a registration center. The commission also proposes to stem the cost of elections. Kenya conducts one of the most expensive elections in the world with only 22,120,258 registered voters so far. The 2022 General Election cost taxpayers Sh44.6 billion with IEBC spending Sh2000 per voter in the voting process. IEBC attributes the high cost to personnel, polling stations, technology, voter education, electoral security, litigation and petitions, hire of transport and logistics, ballot papers and tallying centers. It suggests the re-use of technology in elections, capping of voters per polling station at 700, re-use of GE materials in the warehouses, capping the number of ballot papers to the total number of voters per polling station and engaging stakeholders to build trust in the commission thus reducing litigations. According to the national government budget implementation review reports from 2018 to 2021, the commission spent a total of Sh2.6 billion on legal fees alone. To enhance efficiency from voter education, registration and biometric identification among others, the commission is pushing for an enhanced technology-dependent system that would stem some of the challenges experienced in the previous elections. Last year, IEBC used Kenya Integrated Election Management System (Kiems), Biometric Voter Registration (BVR) system, Electronic Voter, Identification System, Results Transmission System and Candidate Registration Management System. Kiems kits "In 99.4 per cent of the polling stations, polling officials verified voters biometrically or by name through the Kiems kit before voting," read a post-election report by Elections Observation Group (Elog). Elog further said there was also a drop in the failure rate of Kiems kits during voter identification from 7.6 per cent in 2017 to 6.1 in 2022. However, 79.7 per cent of the polling stations had a physical register of voters, helping to address challenges in voter identification. The commission is also putting emphasis on voter education to deal with the issue of rejected votes which ideally means a ballot that cannot be counted due to improper marking by the voter. In the just concluded election, 113,614 Kenyans voted but their votes ended up being rejected. In a study to identify the main causes of rejected votes, IEBC said the main causes of rejected ballots included voters putting more than one mark, voters marking against more than one candidate, unmarked ballot papers, voters marking outside the designated box and voters writing their names or signatures on the ballot papers. With the report coming months after the chaos that erupted at Bomas of Kenya before the announcement of the presidential results on August 15, 2022, IEBC now wants a revision of the tallying center guide/manual to take into consideration operations under crisis. Noting that election security training is not included in the National Police Service training, IEBC is also recommending the inclusion of election security in the Police Training Curriculum. Similarly, the commission is pushing for enhanced engagement with the Treasury to have funds disbursed in time something the report shows exposes it to challenges relating to non-compliance with constitutional set electoral timelines, procurement laws and inadequate time to test the electoral technologies. "Funding for all election technologies and its infrastructure should be provided two years before the General Election to allow for adequate time for implementation, testing and deployment of technology solutions," reads the report. A report by the International Election Observation Mission to Kenya also found that budget delays, intricate legislative requirements related to timelines and the use of technology, ongoing litigation and extremely late changes in procedure threatened timely election preparations and the perceived administrative competence of the IEBC.

IEBC report calls for key reforms before next poll

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