Prisoners enlisted for Vote

Hundreds of prisoners missed out on the voter registration that kicked off Friday in the country's penal institutions due to lack of identification cards

Officials from Interim Independent Electoral Commission (IIEC) and prisons department officially launched the seven day exercise at the Kamiti Maximum Prisons.

This is the first time in the country's history inmates are participating in an electoral process.

This follows a recent court ruling allowing prisoners to take part in the August 4th referendum on the proposed constitution.

IIEC Chair Isaack Hassan says only those with national identity dentity cards and of sound mind will be enlisted.

At the Naivasha G.K prison, a mere 80 prisoners had IDs as required by the electoral body.

The prison has over 3,600 inmates and the lack of any identification documents emerged as one of the biggest challenge in the exercise.

And at the nearby Naivasha Annex Prison, only 46 inmates were registered against a capacity of 700 inmates.

According to Ms Peris Saina from the IIEC and who supervised the electronic registration, the laid down rules had to be followed to the letter.

She said that only those inmates with the legal and recognized documents would be registered in the exercise.

In Maralal, only 10 inmates were regsitered. The Maralal G.K prison in Samburu district has 179 inmates. Prison officials said the prisoners did not have identity cards.

The inmates who were registered broke into celebrations saying they were priviledged to be part of the constitution making process.

A five judge bench last week directed the electoral body to register the inmates in the next 21 days starting Thursday.

Only inmates who are of sound mind, age of 18 and have their Identification cards qualify to register for the referendum set for 4th of August this year.

The suit had been filed by inmates from Shimo La Tewa.

Section 43 (c ) of the current constitution disqualifies convicts from voting in a presidential, parliamentary and civic elections but the convicts told the Court that the section of the law does not bar prisoners from participating in a referendum.