A clean poll today will herald a peaceful 2012
Voters in Nairobi’s Kamukunji Constituency go the polls Thursday in a parliamentary by-election that again stands as credibility test for the Interim Independent Electoral Commission.
The electoral management outfit has, by all accounts, passed with flying colours in a number of civic and parliamentary by-elections and a landmark constitutional referendum since it replaced the disgraced Electoral Commission of Kenya after the botched 2007 presidential polls.
However, this particular by-election is something of an acid test for a Commission that has recently been driven with infighting.
The chairman and some commissioners have been at war with the chief electoral officer, a development that does not augur well for the credibility of a pivotal institution.
The feud has also come at time when the interim body is in a state of transition as it prepares to pave the way for the more permanent Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission.
The integrity of our electoral system cannot be hostage to petty turf wars and personality conflicts.
Kenyans remember starkly, from 2007, the consequences of an election tainted with fraud and managed by a body that could not be trusted to run a competent and transparent poll.
All participants must have full faith and trust in the management of the election; and thus will have absolutely no excuse to dispute the results.
That is why it is important that those managing the Kamukunji by-election put aside petty bickering and devote all their energies to a delivering a flawless poll.
They must also bear in mind that any election serves as a dress-rehearsal for 2012, and anything less than a free, fair and transparent general election next year would be too terrible to contemplate.
