The Kenyan Election

Monday 4^th March - All eyes on Kenya. The aftermath of the 2007 vote still hangs above the country like a cloud, ready to pour with rain: ethnic tension, corrupt politicians and chaos. Everyone has long memories and it is hard not to recall the horrific post-election violence that loomed last time when facing the new election head-on. Escaping Mombasa, I decided to head to the peaceful rolling hills of Kisii. Here, I can enjoy my enforced holiday in the comfort of a family home without the fear of living alone in one of the most diverse (and consequently dangerous) cities in Kenya.

The buildup to Election Day in Mombasa verged on the ridiculous. Huge bill boards were strategically placed at busy crossroads showing smug faces, which were looking down with their extreme wealth on ordinary Kenyans. This time was even more elaborate than 2007 – with the new Kenyan constitution (enacted in 2010) everyone is entitled to vote for 6 positions to represent them on both a county and a country level, rather than just the one presidential vote. This gives even more opportunity for politicians to spend their black-money…. It has been predicted that the big names of Kenyan politics spend approximately 1 million dollars per day on their campaign: paid young people with forced cheer pranced around in party trucks; 6 aeroplanes spanned the length and breadth of the country, shuttling endless politicians to their next meeting; anyone willing was given the bright orange or red caps and t-shirts to symbolise the ODM and TNA party respectively. But that is nothing… heaven forbid if you get caught amongst a party parade!

Saturday 23^rd February – Group trip to the South Coast. The dreaded happened. Waiting in line for the ferry across from the island, we stumbled across the ODM party train. The noise smacked our senses first – jubilant voices singing a “go Joho, go Joho” tune accompanied by a cacophony of sounds blaring from several struggling loudspeakers. Next was the visual spectacle – a procession of at least thirty glaring orange cars slowly moved along the road. When one car disappeared, another emerged into view with the persistence of water dripping from a tap. Five minutes later and I was still reeling from the sheer extravagance. Assuming the cars were bought primarily for election purposes, this money could have supported a whole community for months in a country which still registers as 143 in the United Nations Human Development Index, meaning it is "low" in human development. I wonder how this ostentatious display of wealth can generate an affinity towards these politicians in the voters, instead I just felt further estranged.

Monday 25^th February – The Presidential Debate. The estrangement continued with this ceremonial display of rhetoric. Eight presidential aspirants vied for the limelight in a slow-moving battle of cutting jibes and pointed rebuffs. After a long evening of rehearsals for the up-and-coming school production, I escaped the confines of the school compound to watch the debate in a local coffee shop with the Mombasa well-to-do. The word corruption was bandied around amongst the aspirants with a lackadaisical ignorance as if they were as white as snow. This is a sickening realisation given the fact that the front runner (Odinga) has been implicated in rigging the votes in 2007 and his competitor (Kenyatta) is currently indicted by the International Criminal Courts for crimes against humanity during the post-election violence. Their barbed comments were met by a blatant cynicism in the Café Mocha crowd. The middle-class punters reacted with jeers and jokes, unable to believe the bombastic pomp of the politicians. It makes you wonder how people can feel motivated to walk for miles, queue for hours, and face the rigmarole of voting in a country whose politicians mask the hidden truth underneath layers and layers of dishonesty and sleaze.

Monday 4^th March – Return to voting day. People do feel motivated to cast their vote because ultimately Election Day is the time the population can exercise their sovereign right to choose their next president as well as their local and regional leaders. One has to embrace this display of democracy if a country is to progress, even if the potential pool of aspirants is far from ideal.

Yet the hype of intricate party campaigns seemed far removed from the actual mechanics of voting day in the Bobasi constituency in Kisii. Mathews and I wandered through the stunning green tea plantations to the voting station of Nyamagwa Primary School. Surrounded by chattering women in brightly clad outfits, I watched as an outsider looking into the goldfish bowl of rural Kenyan voting. The community hustle appeared too exuberant as the background noise for an event which seals Kenya’s fate for the next five years. Long queues spilled out of the school building, necessitating hours of waiting in searing hot sunshine. Apparently the main burden on the voting process was the presence of illiterate voters – each requiring individual attention by polling personnel to read the name of all candidates for the six positions before they gave their vote and receive the ritualistic ink stain on their little finger to prove it.

The uneducated in Kenya pose further issues due to their engrained tribal biases. A common belief held by Kisii elders is that all Luos (Odinga’s tribe) are ‘children’ as they have not been circumcised - therefore denying ODM the Gusii-vote. Yet even more frightening is the presence of TNA party members who were apparently paying villagers (who are known to be ODM subscribers) 1,000 ksh to hand in their voting card, and as a consequence revoke their right to vote. The natural need for money amongst Kenya’s poor therefore becomes a bargaining tool used to exploit and rig the vote.  This appears to be a throw-back to the malpractice of 2007 and a worrying sign against the legitimacy of the results announced this week.

Friday 9^th March – Results day.  The last four days have been torturous. We have been constantly waiting for the presidential results to be called: checking facebook on the phone at 3 o’clock in the morning, visiting a local restaurant to watch results come in live on television, streaming results through the radio wherever possible. Still, at 2.55pm on Friday 9^th March, no candidate has been confirmed. What is more frustrating is the piecemeal announcement of numbers constituency-by-constituency which gives you little flavour of the wider national picture. There has been debacle after debacle within the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC). Firstly, people were queuing up until midnight of election day (even once the line is officially closed at 5pm) and some failed to clock their vote before the deadline ended. Secondly, the incredibly expensive biometric data voting tools malfunctioned and were declared useless. Thirdly, the technologically advanced system of vote transmission from rural areas to Nairobi was said to “lack reliability” (rumour has it that TNA hacked in and were electronically rigging the votes) and as a consequence everything is delayed because now results are being announced through manually collated results. Fourthly, there have been a huge number of rejected votes which cannot be counted due to simple errors of placing them in the wrong box or putting a tick in an undesignated place on the ballot.  Sceptics are also querying the huge voter turnout in the Rift Valley and Central Province (Kenyatta strongholds), arguing it is near impossible to get 100% of registered people voting.  However the frustration felt by these challenges has been replaced by despair in the Moywaywa household as Uhuru Kenyatta seems to be lengthening his lead.

It seems likely that this time tomorrow the population of Kenya will be resigning themselves to an Uhuru Kenyatta victory, or in the best case scenario a run-off (second voting session) which will extend into April. The son of Kenya’s first president, Uhuru is part of one of the richest families in East Africa. Rumour states that he owns more land than the whole of Nyanza province put together and as a consequence seems disenfranchised from the average Kenyan. Yet he and his running mate (Ruto) hold the block vote of the Kikuyu and Kalenjin tribes and as a consequence a huge chunk of the electorate. Their up-and-coming ICC trial will see them forced to yo-yo between The Hague and Africa, defending their reputation while “running the country by Skype” (Kenyatta, Presidential Debate 18^th February). Yet even more scary is the likely economic sanctions which will be imposed by the West, an unknown effect of the election which will gradually place its strangling fingers on Kenya’s poor.

Kofi Annan stated that “The elections must be peaceful, free and fair” (Daily Nation, 3^rd March). What’s the verdict? Peaceful – largely, sporadic outbreaks of violence occurred in Mombasa, Garissa and Mandera but not to the extent of the 2007 elections. Free – unlikely, when some people’s votes have been bought, denied or rejected. Fair – who knows? I have no doubt critics will be delving into the IEBC shambles over the following days and I imagine the integrity of the 2013 elections will be debated for many years to come.