KENYA DECIDES: Electoral Body Appeals For Patience
Jubilee's Uhuru Kenyatta still Holding onto his Lead
The Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) has appealed for patience and calm from the public as it tallies the final results of Monday’s election.
Isaack Hassan, the IEBC chairperson, assured the public in press conference in Nairobi this morning that there is no cause for worry as the commission is doing everything possible to ensure the results are delivered in time and in a manner which is absolutely transparent.
He asked the public, the political parties and the candidates to observe patience.
He says as the results continue to trickle in, only provisional results from over 10, 000 of the more than 33, 000 polling centres across the country have been delivered.
He says that whereas the counting of the votes is almost over from all the 290 constituencies and 47 counties across the country, the presiding officers are yet to deliver to the national tally centre the results from their tallying.
He says the only returning officer who has arrived in Nairobi at the tally center is the one who was in charge of the election in Diaspora.
Hassan warned against any early celebration and or complaints from the public and candidates since the results reflect only about 25 percent of the total vote cast.
The preliminary results released by this morning put the Jubilee candidate Uhuru Kenyatta ahead of and Raila Odinga of Cord by about 400, 000 votes.
Kenyatta has about 2, 161, 966 votes while Odinga has 1, 629, 737 votes representing 54.50% for Kenyatta and Odinga 40.16% of the votes. Kenya has about 14.3 million voters.
Hassan said they have taken an oath as the commission and are aware that all the members of the commission would be held liable for any electoral misconduct and it is the reason they are trying to be as transparent as possible.
He said the commission is much conscious about unnecessary delay of declaring the results and in a way which does not attract any suspicion something he blamed the defunct electoral body that handled the 2007 election which turned violent after the results were announced.
He said the 2007 election was very peaceful, but tension and violence came up as a result of misconduct by the electoral body, something he promised they will try to avoid in this election as the memory of the 2007 election violence is still fresh in the minds of people.
Kenya held a general election on Monday to vote for a new president, members of parliament, senators, county governors and women representatives.
The presidential race attracted eight candidates, but the contest is believed to come down to between Prime Minister Odinga and Deputy Prime Minister Kenyatta.
The other candidates are Martha Karua, Musalia Mudavadi, Peter Kenneth, Mohammed Dida, Paul Muite and James Ole Kiyiapi.
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