Governors tell IEBC to address system hacking fears
Council of Governors ICT Committee Chairman Ken Lusaka speaks during an ICT summit at Leisure Lodge Resort in Diani, Kwale County, on April 10, 2017. He called on the IEBC to address fears that its systems could be hacked during the August elections. PHOTO | WACHIRA MWANGI | NATION MEDIA GROUP
What you need to know:
- He said manipulation of the results could throw the country into confusion and chaos.
- The Bungoma governor was speaking Monday at an ICT summit dubbed “Connected 2017”.
- He also urged governors to embrace digital technology to reduce corruption in counties.
Governors want fears that the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission’s systems could be hacked and results manipulated addressed.
The chairman of the Council of Governors' Information, Communications and Technology (ICT) Committee, Kenneth Lusaka, said even if the digital system is used to relay the results, there should be a manual back-up that is credible and cannot not be manipulated.
The Bungoma governor was speaking Monday at an ICT summit called “Connected 2017” at Leisure Lodge Resort in Kwale.
“In a few months’ time, we are going to face an election. You realise the tension that the system to be adopted was generating in the whole country and again it has something to do with cybercrime.
“There were attacks and counter-attacks from both sides of the political divide as to which system should be used.
"The greatest fear is hacking the system, because people have fears that the results would be manipulated at some point so that we do not get the desires of the voters,” he said.
RESULTS
He said manipulation of the results could throw the country into confusion and chaos.
“This is why we have one set of leaders saying let us have a manual back-up because this system might even breakdown so that we don’t throw this country into a crisis. This is something that must be addressed.
“Let us use this summit to change ideas and come up with solutions to help this country,” said the governor.
He also urged governors to embrace digital technology to reduce corruption in counties.
REVENUE COLLECTION
Mr Lusaka said counties lose a lot of money through the manual revenue collection.
“Counties’ involvement in this summit is very important. As counties, the automation of our systems has seen us increase our revenue collection. Whatever revenue we receive from the national government is based on how much local revenue we generate as counties,” he said.
He said ICT is increasingly being recognised by county governments as a powerful tool in the quest to rid the public sector of corruption.
“There was some misconception that counties did not want to use the integrated financial management information system. That is far from it. We want efficiency.
“One way of fighting corruption is to go ICT especially in revenue collection and procurement systems,” he said.
