Kenyan general election, 2017

[neilm]

Sept 3, 2017 13:38:18 GMT timrollpickering said:

Jun 21, 2017 15:25:43 GMT @odo said:

Many Odinga supporters point out that the Kikuyus and Kalenjin only make up 35% and will never get back in power if they lose it because "the 40 tribes" (the rest of the population) will be able to outvote them, so they will do anything to stop an Odinga victory.

There are officially 44 tribes - is the 40 others comment an innocent mistake or do Odinga & supporters not recognise the Makonde and Asians as tribes?

Indeed has they been any notable support for either candidate from the Asian community? Or even from white Kenyans?

Are the Makonde actually Kenyan citizens now? I recall there being a fuss about it around a year ago but haven't seen anything since.

[Deleted]

Sept 3, 2017 13:38:18 GMT timrollpickering said:

Jun 21, 2017 15:25:43 GMT @odo said:

Many Odinga supporters point out that the Kikuyus and Kalenjin only make up 35% and will never get back in power if they lose it because "the 40 tribes" (the rest of the population) will be able to outvote them, so they will do anything to stop an Odinga victory.

There are officially 44 tribes - is the 40 others comment an innocent mistake or do Odinga & supporters not recognise the Makonde and Asians as tribes?

Indeed has they been any notable support for either candidate from the Asian community? Or even from white Kenyans?

I doubt many black Kenyans consider the Asians a tribe, that is a "PC" move, but I am fairly sure  40 is just a rounded number.

[Davıd Boothroyd]

New Presidential election on 17 October.

[Davıd Boothroyd]

Sept 5, 2017 8:31:30 GMT @trident said:

Sept 4, 2017 15:29:42 GMT Davıd Boothroyd said:

New Presidential election on 17 October.

Is it just the presidential election that has been annulled?

Yes. Judgment here

[Deleted]

Odinga wants longer time to revise the whole proces, which has been denied, but at least he gets a new team to organize the election.

"Electoral officials who mishandled the August 8 presidential election have refused to resign, an IEBC commissioner has revealed.

The Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commissioner Roselyn Akombe on Wednesday told the Bloomberg that failure of the officials to resign forced Chairman Wafula Chebukati to select a team that he has confidence in.

“In a normal democracy, people would have introspected, they would have opted to step aside,” Bloomberg quotes Ms Akombe as saying.

“They have failed to do that. They have refused,” she added in a phone interview.

IEBC on Tuesday appointed six people to handle the October 17 election after the Supreme Court held that the August 8 poll was not conducted in accordance with the Constitution and the Elections Act."

www.nation.co.ke/news/-IEBC-chiefs-refused-to-resign-Roselyn-Akombe/1056-4085268-s6j44f/index.html

[Deleted]

We got the full judgment from the SC yesterday. The main points (according to The Nation):

- The judges castigated IEBC for defying the order to open its system for scrutiny, saying this could have helped the commission debunk NASA's claims that its servers were hacked.

- The Supreme Court holds IEBC chairman Wafula Chebukati responsible for failure to explain why presidential election results were not transmitted in the prescribed manner.

- IEBC has the responsibility to ensure that the system of voting, counting and tallying of results is verifiable and accurate.

- NASA proved that IEBC declared the presidential winner before receiving all 40,883 Forms 34As and thus used forms with dubious authenticity.

- There is no evidence that President Uhuru Kenyatta used the release of funds for IDPs as a campaign tool to entice voters.

- IEBC must henceforth conduct subsequent elections in conformity to the law.

- In the repeat presidential poll IEBC must put in place a complementary system for use when technology fails.

- A random scrutiny of 4,299 Forms 34As showed there were widespread discrepancies.

[Deleted]

NASA still threaten to boycott the revote if a host of demands aren't met.

[Deleted]

The revote has been postponed 9 days to October 26 by the IEBC to give them better time to prepare.

Meanwhile Kenyatta has said in a televised address to the people that the SC has "subverted the will of the people" with its judgment.

Raila Odinga still demands a full overhaul of the IEBC (including sacking its CEO Ezra Chiloba) before he will participate in the rerun.

www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-09-21/kenya-sets-oct-26-election-as-president-slams-court-s-ruling

[Deleted]

"Kenyan opposition leader Raila Odinga has pulled out of October's election re-run. Mr Odinga said his withdrawal would give the electoral commission enough time to introduce reforms that will help deliver a more credible election."

www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-41572128

[Deleted]

I do not have time to dig deeper into this, but its clearly going to be really bad and I think Odinga made a big mistake.

The government has banned demonstrations within the CBDs in Nairobi, Mombasa and Kisumu following mass destruction of property. Acting Interior Cabinet Secretary Fred Matiangi has declared the there city centres no-go zones.

[Deleted]

Outside of the whole (aborted) presidential re-run farce the net result was that Jubilee lost two Senators and now only has a one seat majority; they also lost 33 assemblymen and no longer have a majority in the National Assembly, although they are only five seats short. A large number of new parties (seemingly mostly personalist) got in and the number of Indies in the National Assembly increased from four to 14 in the Assembly and from nil to one in the Senate.

The core of NASA (the Orange Democratic Movement) also had a bad election and lost 20 seats in the Assembly, but gained three in the Senate.

Jubilee now have 29 of 47 county governors after a bloodbath where 25 governors failed to get reelected. This is a net gain, but hard to say by how much due to party switches. Counties that elected opposition governors in 2013 have been punished for it by the government in various ways, so a logical outcome.

Kenya got its three first female governors and three women were directly elected to the Senate (also a first, all previous female Senators have been elected on the reserved quota).

[Deleted]

"A senior member of Kenya's electoral commission (IEBC) has resigned, saying the country is unable to hold credible elections next week. Roselyn Akombe said the IEBC was under political "siege", unable to reach consensus or take any decisions. Now in the US, she told the BBC she had feared for her safety while in Kenya after receiving numerous threats."

www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-41660880

[Deleted]

Very low turnout in the revote today:

"In stark contrast to the first ballot in August, which was annulled by the Supreme Court, only a handful of voters could be seen at many polling stations in an election likely to face more legal battles after its conclusion. In opposition strongholds in the slums of Nairobi and the west of the country, protesters barricaded roads and polling stations, lobbing rocks at police who fired teargas to disperse them."

allafrica.com/stories/201710260507.html

[Deleted]

Unsurprisingly Kenyatta is headed for s landslide in the re-run due to opposition boycott:

"With 74 out of 291 constituencies reporting, the Jubilee Party candidate had garnered 2, 477,878 votes. His arch-rival Raila Odinga, who pulled out of the repeat poll citing refusal by the electoral commission to create a level playing ground, had received 19, 568 votes. The rest of the six candidates had managed less than 10, 000 votes each. The Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission put the turnout in the 74 constituencies at 45.47 per cent."

www.nation.co.ke/news/Kenya-elections-IEBC-official-results-update/1056-4159600-r8rmyc/index.html

[Deleted]

Odinga has declared NASA for a "resistance movement" against what he terms "a dictatorship" and embarked on open rebellion claiming Jubilee have caused the formation of the movement by attempting to establish an unlawful government. This will get (even more) ugly.

“Uhuru and Ruto have invited us to exercise the sovereign power directly as enshrined in the very first article of our Constitution. We have accepted the invite and we will embark on a national campaign of defiance of illegitimate governmental authority and non-cooperation with all its organs”

“From today we are transforming Nasa into a resistance movement, embark on a national campaign of defiance of illegitimate governmental authority and non-co-operation with all its organs and boycott the goods and services offered by the businesses for whose benefit dictatorship is being established”

“Since Jubilee has insisted to carry on with the sham election today, we will not recognise or respect the President, his deputy, any order from Dr Matiang’i, county commissioners and all the others”

www.nation.co.ke/news/Why-Nasa-transformed-to-civil-disobedience-drive/1056-4156174-idhxxd/index.html

[Deleted]

"Could parts of Kenya really secede? In its worst political crisis in over a decade, is a divided Kenya the answer?

Kenya is experiencing its worst political crisis in more than a decade, prompting some politicians to suggest extreme solutions – including the division of Kenya into two countries."

issafrica.org/iss-today/could-parts-of-kenya-really-secede

[neilm]

Nov 13, 2017 23:12:58 GMT @odo said:

"Could parts of Kenya really secede? In its worst political crisis in over a decade, is a divided Kenya the answer?

Kenya is experiencing its worst political crisis in more than a decade, prompting some politicians to suggest extreme solutions – including the division of Kenya into two countries."

issafrica.org/iss-today/could-parts-of-kenya-really-secede

There was a plan for this in the 1930s, IIRC. I may be wrong as I'm half remembering something from a sixth form discussion.

[Deleted]

Kenyan civil society groups had filed two petitions to declare the rerun invalid, alleging the Electoral Commission broke the law by failing to call for new nominations, but the SC has today unanimously decided to dismiss both petitions. 

That formally ends the elections and Kenyatta can now the sweared in. Big demonstrations from both sides (joy and protest respectively) following the decision.

[Foggy]

According to the Kenyan Constitution, "[t]he President-elect shall be sworn in on the first Tuesday following [...] the seventh day following the date on which the court renders a decision declaring the election to be valid".

So, it appears that Kenyatta should only take the oath of office on the 5th of December, but I guess he will actually do so sometime next week when he feels like it.

[Deleted]

Nov 22, 2017 1:35:37 GMT Foggy said:

According to the Kenyan Constitution, "[t]he President-elect shall be sworn in on the first Tuesday following [...] the seventh day following the date on which the court renders a decision declaring the election to be valid".

So, it appears that Kenyatta should only take the oath of office on the 5th of December, but I guess he will actually do so sometime next week when he feels like it.

He will be sworn in on the 28th. The first Tuesday following the stipulated seven day interval after the court has rendered its decision.