Kenyans to know referendum results by Friday

Returning officers of 42 far-flung constituencies will be airlifted to Nairobi to avoid a delay in announcing referendum results.

And Kenyans will know the results 48 hours after the start of the referendum, the Interim Independent Electoral commission said on Sunday.

“The IIEC has identified 42 constituencies from where the returning officers shall be airlifted due to their distance from Nairobi,” IIEC chief executive officer James Oswago told journalists at Bomas of Kenya on Sunday.

This is expected to hasten the announcement of the referendum results upon delivery to the national tallying centre as those sent electronically are provisional.

The law does not recognise electronic formats of election results; it is only what is contained in a hard copy Form 16A that is read out by the returning officer as the official results.

This will, however, change when the Election Bill 2010 goes through Parliament since it approves the use of electronic records in elections.

IIEC has adopted e-tallying to be used for the first time countrywide after its trial in the most recent South Mugirango and Matuga by-elections.

The national electoral body hopes to use the system to restore confidence and ensure transparency of the electoral process.

The new system, known as Parallel Vote Tabulation (PVT), is an election observation method that will transmit the provisional electronic results from every polling station simultaneously to the various constituency tallying centres and to the national tallying centre in Nairobi.

The system involves observation of the voting and counting of ballots at polling stations, collection of results and independent tabulation.

The results are filled in at the same time and the party representatives asked to sign the physical Form 16A before the electronic one is sent to Nairobi.

The IIEC is said to have deployed 21,000 mobile phones to all polling stations to be used for the transmission of the provisional results.

“All returning officers countrywide are IIEC permanent staff who have been properly trained and can be punished accordingly if involved in an election malpractice,” Mr Oswago said, adding the hiring was in a bid to encourage transparency and accountability in all polling stations.

According to Mr Oswago, it is all systems go as the country prepares to go to the polls on Wednesday.

“For the official declaration of results from the constituencies, we shall use the physical form 7 duly signed by the returning officers and witnessed by the various referendum committees’ agents,” Mr Oswago added.

Security has also been improved, with total 63,247 police officers deployed to ensure the polling stations countrywide were secure.

The national tallying centre situated at Bomas of Kenya will be manned by the IIEC secretarial staff.

Giving reasons on the choice of the cultural centre, Mr Oswago cited the availability of requisite facilities and the historical association of Bomas with the constitution review process.

Mr. Oswago confirmed that the distribution of referendum materials to the 17 regional centres has already been completed, awaiting allotment to the respective polling centres.

The distribution of materials from the national warehouse situated in Nairobi to the regional warehouses was done using eight 10-tonne and four 20-tonne lorries.

“A call centre has been set up in Nairobi to receive any enquiries arising from the constituencies concerning the distribution of the materials,” Mr Oswago

The campaigns are expected to run until August 2, two days to the August 4 referendum.

Voters in 18 constituencies where the Electronic Voter Registration was rolled out will have their names verified electronically using the e-poll book.

Manual registers will also be present in the 18 constituencies with every registered voter’s paragraph for verification.

Amongst the voters in next week’s national exercise are a total of 5,605 prisoners after a court ordered that they be allowed to vote.

Voters will not only dip a finger in indelible ink, but will also get a mark from a "spring marker pen" which remains visible for over a month.

The IIEC has also accredited both local and international observers to monitor the conduct of the referendum and the national tallying process at Bomas of Kenya.

Diplomats from the various missions and international organisations present in the country have also been accredited, Mr Oswago added.

Also present at the press briefing was Interim Independent Electoral Commission deputy chief executive Gladys Boss Shollei and other IIEC officials.