Why polls offered little headache to Kenyatta and Moi

By Oscar Obonyo

Nairobi KENYA: If he were to return today, founding PresidentJomo Kenyatta would shake his head in awe at the grueling struggle and energy sapping campaigns his son, Uhuru, is enduring to inherit the seat he occupied at independence.   

Unlike the Jubilee Alliance presidential candidate, who is spending millions of shillings daily to fly across the country to woo voters, the older Kenyatta and his immediate successor Daniel Moi became tenants of State House with relative ease. 

Mzee would also discover that now one needs to be a holder of at least a university degree to run the affairs of the country. On this ground, he would not regret giving his son sound education locally and overseas. Except for the vicious boardroom battles with party functionaries, Kenyatta and Moi had little to worry about the people’s say at the ballot. Kenyatta’s lead role in the independence struggle alone, for instance, is what assured him of his position as Kenya’s Chief Executive.

Kenyatta ruled for 15 years without facing any credible presidential election, as initially did his successor, the third Vice-President, Moi. He ascended to power by virtue of constitutional dictates after Mzee’s demise on August 22, 1978.    

In subsequent elections, however, Moi attempted to demonstrate to Kenyans and the rest of the world, that he was a genuine product of the democratic exercise. This marked the beginning of a break from the past despotic practice.  

The public show unfolded routinely at Nairobi’s Uhuru Park, where the retired President gathered with Kanu party officials and his supporters. The climax of the event, usually relayed live on radio by the national broadcaster, Voice of Kenya, came when Moi handed over his nomination papers to the Supervisor of Elections. During his reign, Joseph Mwangovya and Zachariah Nyarango separately cleared him. After Moi’s presentation, all eyes turned to roads leading to Uhuru Park as the master of ceremony wondered loudly whether anyone else was in sight to hand over his papers. Of course even if there was a challenger, it was unlikely he would penetrate the security apparatus at a presidential function to access the supervisor, seated next to the President.

And after excited mummers, the supervisor rose from his seat a few seconds to midday as supporters counted down the clock. At exactly midday, the President would be declared the sole candidate and therefore duly elected unopposed.

In March 1988, for instance, Moi was elected to a third term, after successfully filing his nomination papers at the Kabarnet High School playground. He was declared elected unopposed as a MP for Baringo Central constituency after no challenger showed up.

The exercise, presided over by Mwangovya, was a mere formality since Moi was the sole presidential candidate having been nominated two days earlier by the ruling Kanu party – then Kenya’s only political outfit. The first real election challenge for Moi came four years later after he declared reintroduction of multiparty politics. He floored opponents twice, in 1992 and 1997 before bowing out after serving two elective terms in office.

Moi’s successor, Mwai Kibaki, equally did so twice, the last under very controversial circumstances. This time around, however, the rules of the game are fairer and stricter. Besides winning a clear majority of over fifty per cent of the votes cast, a presidential winner must also enjoy support of at least 25 per cent in a minimum of 24 counties. 

Away from the presidential race, there are a number of dramatic, absurd and even laughable scenes witnessed during previous elections, that many would today dismiss as sheer lies or episodes from a fiction movie. Take for example, instances where candidates were hijacked just metres away from presenting nomination papers, driven off and released shortly after the midday deadline. There were also cases of hired goons snatching and fleeing with nomination papers of candidates.

Dreaded move

This exercise was indeed most dreaded by parliamentary aspirants. Most careers ended here, at the doorstep of the powerful provincial administration officials who, in the 1960s through to 1980s, executed the all-important exercise under the one party authoritarian rule.

And unlike today, the voting process in 1963, 1969 and 1974, was such that each candidate was assigned a ballot box.

This system made it even easier for rivals to target certain ballot boxes for theft or damage. One notorious case involving perennial rivals, former Cabinet ministers James Nakhwanga Osogo and the late Peter Habenga Okondo of Bunyala constituency (present day Budalang’i in Busia County), has been retold severally. 

In one particular incident, Joseph Oyuga, then a presiding officer at one of the stations, recalls witnessing vicious fist-fights between Osogo and Okondo poll agents, moments before a ballot box belonging to Okondo was thrown out of the window of a moving Government Land Rover vehicle into River Suo.

“Then, after conclusion of voting, presiding officers and poll agents squeezed into a vehicle and headed to the district headquarters where counting and tallying of the polls was done. On this very day, we were heading to Busia when the incident happened,” recalls Oyuga.

Similar instances were replicated across the country every election year, with some tossing opponents’ ballot boxes out into the bush or literally fleeing with them upon sensing defeat. Local District Commissioners, who served as Returning Officers, were largely indifferent to such dirty manoeuvres.

Such archaic electoral systems have since been transformed over the years. Today, for instance, all votes for different candidates are cast in one ballot box. There is also no transportation of the ballot boxes to a far off tallying centre as vote counting is done immediately at every polling station. 

Even as these changes were effected gradually, the Office of President continued control the exercise and the poll calendar. In fact Kenyatta and Moi cronies referred to it as the President’s weapon.

In 1969, Kenyatta’s rivals were wrong-footed when the President disbanded Parliament and called for elections within four months.