Agency underbelly exposed in hearing

The Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission is dancing its leg of trust lame.

Nothing demonstrates this than Monday’s decision to revoke lawyer Kethi Kilonzo’s registration, blocking her from succeeding her late father Mutula Kilonzo as the Makueni Senator.

There are questions surrounding the circumstances of how she became a pawn in the chess games which played out as the three-member tribunal delivered its verdict.

Biometric kits

First, who issued Ms Kilonzo with the registration slip? Two, who cleared her as the Wiper Democratic Movement nominee for the Makueni seat? Three, who revoked her registration as a voter, thereby blocking her from vying?

All the three were either acts of commission or omission by the IEBC, serving as a tip of the iceberg of the so many things which may have gone wrong with the Anniversary Towers based team. Pause and remember these. In May and June last year, the IEBC could not procure the biometric voter registration (BVR) kits because of internal rivalry—the government stepped in and bought them.

Majority of the electronic voter identification devices (EVIDs) which were bought failed to work on March 4th. This failure was magnified by the failure of the results transmission system (RTS) which delayed the announcement of results by days.

For the last three weeks, the IEBC has failed to announce the final results which could allow political parties to share out the parties fund. Explaining the delay, IEBC chairman Ahmed Issack Hassan said they had dispatched the March 4 polls results sheets back to the 337 returning officers for “verifications” before it can publish the final results.

Mr Hassan’s commission has also been under pressure to produce the final results of the last presidential election suspected to have encountered several challenges as several errors have already been pinpointed in the ongoing election petitions across the country.

When they do, they will be under the country’s spotlight.