IEBC in a tight spot as poll disputes drag on

An airport worker pulls a hand forklift with a pellet containing the first batch of ballot papers at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport in Nairobi on June 07, 2022. [Denish Ochieng' Standard]

The electoral commission may suspend elections in some areas if disputes filed in courts are not determined on time.

Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission Chairperson Wafula Chebukati, while pleading with the Judiciary to expedite the cases yesterday, said the window for printing the ballot papers on time was quickly closing.

The first batch of the 132,722,748 ballot papers to be used in the August General Election arrived in the country last Thursday as 31 cases touching on the election remain pending at the High Court.

Mr Chebukati asked the Judiciary to deliver the judgments in good time to enable the commission to proceed with the printing of ballot papers.

“If for any reason (the disputes) are not finalised in good time, then we cannot wait forever, we will be forced to suspend elections in areas where decisions have been made that affect the printing of ballot papers,” Chebukati said at KICC during the Political Decency and Accountability Forum.

“We must deliver the elections on August 9 and we hope the judiciary will fast-track whatever decision they have to make so as not to interfere with the printing of ballot papers.”

He added: “If these cases are not concluded, IEBC will have to set another date, disenfranchising millions of voters on August 9.”

Some of the areas where elections could be suspended include the Mombasa gubernatorial race where former Nairobi Governor Mike Sonko is challenging his exclusion from the contest.

Others are the Nairobi governor election where there is a case challenging the educational qualification of United Democratic Alliance (UDA) candidate Johnson Sakaja and the Kiambu senatorial race where UDA candidate Karungo Thang’wa last week won a case challenging his exclusion.

The High Court will give its ruling on the inclusion of Sakaja in the Nairobi race tomorrow.

Mr Sonko will have to wait until July 15 to know whether he will contest in Mombasa gubernatorial race.

Government printer

The printing of ballot papers began in Greece even as the country waits for IEBC to gazette the list of the candidates who will participate in the August 9 polls.

Chebukati explained that the gazettement was ongoing - echoing a statement he made earlier in the week that the commission had submitted the list of candidates to the government printer on time but technical issues had prevented its publishing.

“The government printer had issues but we shall find out where they are,” he said, noting that when the notice is published, it will read July 1.

Mr Chebukati said they couldn’t stop the whole process of printing the ballot papers when the names that were being printed were the same ones sent to the government printer.

But IEBC is already facing credibility questions for failing to publish a list of candidates.

Paul Mwangi, the chief legal advisor of the Raila Odinga Campaign Secretariat said IEBC was mandated by Regulation 52 to publish a gazette of the names of candidates.

“The law is that until that gazette comes out, then you don’t have a legitimate list of candidates,” he said.

He said that IEBC had raised a constitutional issue by printing ballot papers before the gazettement. “It means there are no legitimate candidates for the positions you have printed ballots and a constitutional issue,” he said.

The Azimio la Umoja continued putting pressure on the polls body yesterday, with the spokesperson of the Raila Odinga campaign Makau Mutua requesting IEBC to provide the voters register and audit reports of the 2017 and 2022 register of voters.