The 12.4 million voters in the registers of the IEBC’s predecessor, the Interim Independent Electoral Commission will be done away with.
The Sh3.7 billion registration programme to be undertaken through Biometric Voter Registration is the most complex since independence, and will reduce errors such as double registration.
“Incidents of politicians buying voters cards to disable perceived supporters of their opponents will now be history, as one can vote without a card so long as his mugshot and finger print reflects in our registers,” Andrew Limo, an IEBC Public Relations Officer told The Standard On Sunday.
The voter registration is likely to run almost concurrently with the Kenya National Integrated Civic Education Programme.
The media civic education campaign has already commenced and will be on radio and TV stations until end of June. Investigation by The Standard On Sunday established preparations were in top gear ahead of the start of the voter registration and education.
Last week, all regional IEBC coordinators were summoned to Nairobi for a meeting, which mapped out strategies and timetable for the electoral programmes.
Nyanza Regional IEBC Coordinator George Oyugi said they met and held discussions on the challenges ahead, including the fact that 60 cases against the commission are currently pending in court.
While announcing the March 4, 2013 election date, IEBC chairman Issack Hassan said the date will give the commission ample time to prepare, starting with a countrywide voter registration exercise.
The Judiciary, however, has to hear more than 60 cases challenging the decision by IEBC to delineate new constituency boundaries.
The cases are to be heard within 90 days. Aggrieved political leaders and constituents, following a Gazette notice published on March 6, 2012 filed the cases. Equally, the problem of national identity cards for youths has also been a persistent matter, given that at least five million people aged 18 years are targeted for voter registration.
Immigration Minister Otieno Kajwang’ says his ministry was working overtime to ensure the documents are ready before elections, and that 60,000 ID cards are being printed per day. “Many youths have no IDs. Those who applied have the cards uncollected. The IDs’ question is a major one which the Immigration ministry alone cannot handle,” says Trade Minister Moses Wetangula.
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Autor(en)/Author(s): Stephen Makabila
Quelle/Source: Standard Digital, 13.05.2012
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