Tender row set to delay voter listing equipment

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Interim Independent Electoral Commission chairman Mr Issack Ahmed Hassan. Photo/FILE 

By DAVE OPIYO dopiyo@ke.nationmedia.com and Isaac Ongiri iongiri@ke.nationmedia.com
Posted  Sunday, July 15  2012 at  23:30

IN SUMMARY

• IEBC intends to use the kit to register 18 million new voters starting August 14

A tender row is likely to disrupt preparations for the upcoming General Election.

The elections agency had wanted to use the new equipment to electronically register 18 million new voters.

On Sunday elections chairman Ahmed Issack Hassan told the Nation that though it was expected that the registration would start by August 14 the commission postponed the exercise to start after the holy month of Ramadhan.

Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission CEO James Oswago also conceded that they were ‘late’ in putting up structures to enable electronic voter registration.

“We will work hard to resolve all the problems. I can assure Kenyans that we shall have an electronic register,” Mr Oswago told the Nation.

Elsewhere the public procurement authority questioned the manner in which the tendering process for the supply of biometric voter’s registration (BVR) kit was undertaken.

In a letter Mr Oswago, Public Procurement Oversight Authority (PPOA) director-general M.J.O Juma questioned whether this may have played a role in the resignation of the tendering committee.

Mr Juma pointed out anomalies in the bid such as unauthorised persons attending opening of the tenders, different requirements given to the bidders and awarding of the tender to a bidder ranked third.

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On Friday night the IEBC’s tender committee team that has been embroiled in board room battles over who to award the lucrative but highly sensitive BVR solutions tender resigned in a huff and by Sunday top commission officials denied knowledge of that decision.

PPOA’s letter was in response to Mr Oswago’s letter, who had questioned whether it was prudent to award the tender to a firm that had quoted way above the IEBC’s budget and whether the decision of the Tender Committee is justified.

The Committee is said to have recommended that Face Technologies of South Africa be allowed to supply the kits at Sh4.78 billion above IEBC’s budget of Sh3.97 billion.