Omamo, Matiang'i blast opposition over KDF rigging claims

The government on Saturday fought back claims of involving the military to rig elections, claims made by opposition National Super Alliance (Nasa) on Friday.

Interior Acting Cabinet Secretary Fred Matiang’i and his Defence counterpart Raychelle Omamo described the claims as “claims from the street” and denied there was any plot to rig elections.

“We are at a time when our security agencies are being subjected to rumour mongering and gossip which is unacceptable,” said Dr Matiang’i at a press conference in Kisumu.

MANDATE

“The government and security agencies do not conduct elections. IEBC does. We have an impartial and competent security agencies,” he added.

The two ministers were fighting back sensational claims tabled by Nasa principals on Friday in which they said Kenya Defence Forces had been dragged into an elaborate plot to rig elections in favour of President Uhuru Kenyatta.

And while KDF later confirmed the documents tabled by Nasa, only clarifying they had been quoted out of context, Ms Omamo said she had not seen the documents at all.

“I have not seen the documents. All we are saying is we will not rig elections. KDF will continue to discharge their mandate within the law. KDF has no plans to disenfranchise any citizen,” she said.

NASA

The two ministers refused to answers questions on the specific details of the operations by the KDF as claimed by Nasa.

Ms Omamo accused the opposition of being irresponsible by publishing names of soldiers set to head planned operations..

But they declined to discuss the curious insertions in the documents, such as planned shutdown of electricity and water supplies, crowd control operations by the military, deployment of new recruits to violence hotspots, and use of phones of dead people, ostensibly to dodge any tracing after elections.