Thoughts on upcoming Kenyan Presidential elections

Thanks to my wonderful graduate assistant Shem Ngwira for helping me put together this piece. 

            As we await the August 8 elections in Kenya, one cannot rule out the possibility of violent elections as seen in the 2007 Uhuru Kenyatta and Raila Odinga faceoff. The International Criminal Court (ICC) charged Kenyatta with crimes against humanity, which were later dropped. In 2013, Kenya witnessed a closely contested yet peaceful election. Check out my recent article in Journal of Modern African Studies on hate speech in the Kenyan Election in 2013.  Hotly contested issues in the run up to this election include urban youth poverty, domestic terrorist attacks, corruption, and strengthening the rule of law just to mention a few. 

Perennial presidential candidate Raila Odinga alleges that the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) favors Kenyatta’s political party-- Jubilee -- and is not trustworthy. These suspicions led to violent clashes between Odinga’s Coalition for Reforms and Democracy (CORD) and the police in May 2016.  However, the IEBC Chair Issack Hassan mentioned to a parliamentary briefing that the electoral officials were willing to quit prior to elections. This was a result of opposition supporter’s exercising their right to protest hence creating pressure for the IEBC officials to make a public announcement on their electoral stance.

Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission Chairman Wafula Chebukati in Naivasha on March 9, 2017. PHOTO | SULEIMAN MBATIAH | NATION MEDIA GROUP 

 The Jubilee Alliance has been accused of an attempt to buy politicians from the north of Kenya in a campaign to weaken the opposition’s stronghold. The opposition politicians argue that only ‘weak’ northern Members of Parliament will fall prey to the governing party’s beckoning to switch allegiance with the overall aim of reducing votes for Odinga. These suspicions come at a time when the Jubilee party intends to amass political support from small political parties by sponsoring them to pledge allegiance to Kenyatta instead of the opposition political parties.

The 2017 elections have already been marred by a recent server hacking attempt of the IEBC servers. Chairman Wafula Chebukati of IEBC addressed informed the National Assembly’s Legal Affairs Committee but identities of the suspected hackers were left anonymous and assured the public that the servers were protected and not easily penetrated. This may have created further distrust of the Kenyatta administration and simultaneously elevated Odinga’s platform as a social change agent to reform such systemic challenges.

This is only but a snapshot of the events occurring in Kenya and how these tie into the upcoming elections. The tension between Odinga and Kenyatta stemming back from the gruesome events of 2007 laid a foundation of mistrust and strategic sabotage campaigns from both camps. 

We hope to see successful free and fair elections such as seen in 2013, which were approved as such by Carter Center and European Union.  However, the elections and public dissatisfaction in poor performance of the Kenyatta administration in addressing security issues as well as use of police to conduct extra judicial killings of dissenting individuals may have unintentionally set up Odinga for better poll numbers.

Moto Sana, Cool Down

Found a cool image for the above. Check these bad boys out. Maybe they know what they are doing!

Wenzangu, can we make an agreement with each other? Can we just have a conversation? I feel that the coverage of this election is polarizing folks. The media,journalists, observers, activists, and scholars are as stressed out and angry after the election (such that it is) as CORD and Jubilee candidates going in. We all need to just take a deep breath and relax. As my very calm Kenyan cousins are always telling me, "Cool Down."

There is a war of words going on regarding media coverage. I research the nexus between science and technology and the state, and lately, have spent a lot of time on information and communications technology (ICT). ICTs include television, radio, and yes, print media, which is increasingly carried online.

To paraphrase Nelly, "it's getting hot in herre" (C'mon, I am in the diaspora) or as a Kenyan might say, "moto sana."

Poor Michela Wrong, she is just inciting the wrath of the Kenyan blogosphere. But it is a fair matchup, World class author, New York Times blogger and well recognized British journo against the beautiful Kenyan TV journalist Terryane Chebet.

Terryanne is not too happy. Wrong is Wrong You really need to read Terry's piece for yourself, but here is the rundown. She writes "being a reporter in Africa does not make you an expert in African matters." In this sentence, she echoes a sentiment which my former classmate, BBC Reporter Komla Dumor made in a recent talk Telling the African Story. (Disclaimer- I am stealing this link from Terry, but Komla and I went to the JFK School together, so forgive me dada.)

So back to Terry. She is rightfully incensed that for some reason African journalists do not get to run coverage on Africa. I was a little puzzled about this in the coverage of the Kenyan election. Damn, I miss Jeff Koinange. That voice! Koinange at Arise . Why was he not front and center on the coverage? I just do not get it.

Terry is unhappy that Michela Wrong has, in her view, unfairly insinuated that the Kenyan media is corrupt. She notes that "there is a weighing scale that measures the peace and economic future of an entire country against the telling of anxiety that couldn't really be filmed, as really nothing had happened yet."

Okay, so read Terry's article and tell me what you think. Then, there is Gathara. He makes some valuable points. I linked to his article in a previous post, so check out his work. I like his thoughts here, although I am not sure I agree with them.

It is said that truth is the first casualty of war. In this case the war was internal, hidden from all prying eyes. Who cares about the veracity of the poll result? So what if not all votes were counted? We had peace. “The peace lobotomy,” one tweet called it. “Disconnect brain, don't ask questions, don't criticize. Just nod quietly.”

What maturity is this that trembles at the first sign of disagreement or challenge? What peace lives in the perpetual shadow of a self-annihilating violence?


So Gathara, ndugu, I watched the election. I think if not all the votes were counted we need a recount for those contested areas. That is the normal procedure. I am not just nodding quietly, really, I am not. I am just saying that let the process play itself out.


So what I am disagreeing with or challenging is this. Is the fix in? Call me crazy, but I saw a peaceful, free and fair election in the 5 polling stations I was at. That is my story and I am sticking to it. I went to one out of 290 constituencies and then to Bomas. I am waiting to hear about the other 289.

I am beginning to feel like I am considered an "apologist" or a brainless, knee-jerk Jubilee advocate for stating this position.  (I think I made it clear in an earlier post that I hold no truck with UK) But I refuse to let my views conform to the hegemonic discourse when that is not what I saw.  Let's count the 30 constituencies that are having problems. Lets see what happened. Let's let our well trained, highly capable Kenyan jurists have their moment. Lets have a discussion about the spoiled ballots, and how to handle that, and rafiki, lets not panic.


~WMB

Days pass as we wait for the Kenyan Presidential Results

 
Dear readers

I am back in the US now. I feel that my experience watching the Kenyan elections was exhilarating and overwhelmingly positive. Personally, from what I saw, I have a high level of confidence in the IEBC process from what I saw. We still are praying for peace.

When I left Nairobi, over 24 hours ago, people were getting tense waiting for the presidential results. I noticed that the news media were not reporting total percentages for the presidential race anymore. Instead they were reporting official results constituency by constituency. I SPECULATE that this was done to keep things calm both inside and outside of Bomas.

I cannot even get onto the Daily Nation, which is my preferred paper (owned by the Aga Khan). Perhaps the Internet load is too high. The standard is up, and the IEBC is up, although I hear they are updating results to their website manually. I am going to use the East African, which is owned by Nation Media group, as a proxy for the Nation.

I just want to note that, as a matter of logic, the votes from the presidential election must be in and tallied at Bomas. They have already announced the MPs for all 47 counties. Because I watched the votes being counted I know that they counted the presidential race first, before the MP race. Thus, logically, it stands to reason that the numbers of the presidential race are known. I SPECULATE that the delay is being caused by friction between CORD and Jubilee about the final vote count.

The IEBC is reporting results from 14176/31981 of polling stations, in other words, about one half of the votes have been officially verified. The IEBC website, which you can find here  is showing TNA candidate Uhuru Kenyatta leading with 53% with 2,900,198 votes, at the time I am writing this. Conversely, Raila Odinga of the CORD coalition has 2,278,602 votes, for 42% of the total presidential vote. Mudavadi has 3% with 156, 296 votes, Peter Kenneth has 1% with 32,391 votes, and Martha Wangari Karua of Narc Kenya with 20,002 votes or less than 1 percent.

So, the Standard Newspaper is generally considered to be a bit more pro-CORD, whereas the Nation is considered to be a bit more pro-TNA. Nonetheless, the Standard is a reputable media house, so lets see what they say. They are reporting that with results from 153/290 constituencies by 10.20 p.m. Kenya time, Uhuru Kenyatta maintained a lead of  318, 610 votes. The Standard writes that

"Mr Raila Odinga’s Coalition for Reforms and Democracy protested over the incoming results, questioned the process at which they were arrived at, and called for cancellation and fresh start of totaling."

Based on what I saw, I think that the technical failures in the election were dissapointing. However, I think the integrity of the election was very sound, and that the manual process was nearly impossible to rig. I observed tallying at the polling station level, and at the constituency level. I also went to Bomas. It is my view that the only way to rig this election was to steal trucks with ballot boxes (which did actually occur in Mombasa) or to somehow agree at the constituency level among all presiding officers. This would be enormously difficult to pull off, given that at the constituency I went to the POs worked in full view of an audience of 300 political party agents, candidates, and swarms of media and observers. 

The East African (Nation Media Group) is reporting 237 of 290 constituencies reporting. Uhuru Kenyatta has 49.7 percent votes, (5115704) and that Raila Odinga has 43.9 votes (4513233). Under the Kenyan constitution, to win in the first round, a candidate must have 51 percent of the vote, as well as at least 25 Percent of the vote in half of the counties (24). Uhuru has reached this threshold in 31 counties, and Raila has reached this threshold in at least 29 counties. The issue then will be whether Uhuru makes it to 51 percent. 

I ran into Muthoni Wanyeki at Bomas of Kenya thsi week. Writing before the election in the East African, she said Let's hope for the best, prepare for the worst. 

Another issue that was raised is whether the 51 percent should be out of all ballots cast, or out of valid ballots. I will address that in a different post. 

My reporters in the field tell me that people think "Uhuru might win this thing." They tell me that tension in Nairobi is not bad and that "guys jus' want this thing over & done with."

Signing off now to deal with my jet lag. 

~WMB  

So Where Are We in All Of This?

Top Candidates in the Kenyan Election. February 22, 2013

Mwenzangu, the Kenyan election is going to be closely watched.

If it goes well, it could signal a sea change in African politics. If the Kenyan 2013 Presidential Election goes smoothly, and is not very violent, than it will mean that there are at least three African countries with well-functioning multi-party democracies: Ghana, South Africa, and Kenya.

If the Kenyan election goes poorly, and erupts in violence, it will reconfirm stereotypes about the inability of Africans to govern.

As we approach the election, Uhuru Kenyatta and Raila Odinga are neck and neck. According to the IPSOS polling firm, Political Party/Alliance Preference and Presidential Candidate Preference, Uhuru Kenyatta and his Jubilee Alliance garners 44.8 percent of the vote whereas Raila Odinga and the CORD Alliance is garnering 44.4 percent. For the statisticians out there, that race is not only too close to call, it is within less than one percentage point. The same page above has a really cool map of the race by county. Indeed, according to Mr. Tom Wolf at IPSOS Synovate,

With nine days to go, none of the candidates appeared able to garner the 50 per cent-plus one vote threshold set by the Constitution for one to be declared an outright winner.

This means a runoff is likely. With Mudavadi polling 5.2 and other candidates such as Martha Karua and Peter Kenneth in the mix, anything could happen in the second round runoff. Hold on to your seatbelts folks, it is going to be a bumpy ride.

One point that most in the press are not reporting that really disturbs me is the issue of "dynastic succession." Can we really call Kenya a democracy when 50 years after independence, the two strongest candidates are scions of the lions of Independence? The race is not actually competitive when Kenya's royalty names its princes.

~WMB