Jubilee MPs warn Cord over calls for tallying centre

Jubilee MPs have warned that calls by Cord leaders to set up a parallel vote tallying system in the 2017 elections would be a recipe for chaos.

Tiaty MP Asman Kamama said a situation where the country announces two presidents would plunge the country into “total chaos”. He urged leaders in both Jubilee and the opposition to exercise restraint in their utterances.

“Only the IEBC [Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission] is constitutionally mandated to conduct elections [and] hence the country cannot have two referees, which would be a recipe for total chaos,” he said.

He said the most viable option for Cord to reform the IEBC was through the Okoa Kenya and Boresha Kenya referendum drives by the Opposition and Jubilee respectively.

Last week, Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) leader Raila Odinga met the party’s War Council, also dubbed the “politburo”, to reportedly lay the ground for setting up a parallel tallying centre during the next General Election.

STORE VOTES

According to sources at the meeting, ODM Director of Elections Junet Mohamed (Suna East) was directed to travel to Germany this month to complete talks with a German firm to provide a parallel poll system that would collect, transmit, tally and store presidential votes.

He will be accompanied by lawyers, among them Siaya Senator James Orengo. The electronic tallying system was planned to run parallel to the one the IEBC will deploy.

Other measures Cord will take to boost its chances of winning the elections include deploying party agents to cover every polling station countrywide to record and instantly transmit election results, including photographs of the official results announced by returning officers.

The system is expected to transmit results from all the polling stations to a central command centre based in Nairobi.

However, Mr Mohamed dismissed Jubilee's, saying they should not meddle in Cord's internal preparations for the next general election, confirming the opposition would set up its own parallel tallying centre.

“Jubilee had their own tallying system during the 2013 elections which was in tandem with the one for the IEBC, so why are they complaining now,” he asked.

He said Cord had this time around put in place proper mechanisms, including its own vote tallying, saying it would not be business as usual as having lost the last elections, it had learnt its lessons.

Kiambu Senator Kimani Wamatangi said Cord was setting the stage for chaos in 2017, after sensing that they were likely to lose the elections.

“Cord is anticipating that they will lose the elections, going by the statistics of pollsters, and are using the strategy they will use to mitigate their losses and bulldoze their way into power,” he said.

WOO VOTERS
He said it was needless for the opposition to talk about vote tallying 19 months to the elections, saying a better strategy to boost their chances in 2017 would be to use the funds intended for the planned tallying centre to roll out development that will woo the voters.

Mukurwe-ini MP Kabando wa Kabando claimed Cord was planning for confusion in the next elections to precipitate chaos, wondering why the coalition's leaders were keen on setting up their own tallying when they would have Cord agents at every polling station.

He said: “Cord is desperate while we in Jubilee are ready for peaceful elections within [the] mainstream democratic process.”