Kenya: Commonwealth - Poll Validity in Doubt
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The East African Standard (Nairobi)
18 January 2008
Posted to the web 17 January 2008
Judy Ogutu
Nairobi
A final report by the Commonwealth Observer Group has again faulted the outcome of the presidential vote, saying its validity was in doubt.
The report says ECK has so far not succeeded in establishing the integrity of the tallying process.
"The Commonwealth Observer Group has concluded that the process after the close of polling did not meet international standards," said Commonwealth secretary general, Mr Don McKinnon.
Consequently, McKinnon has urged President Kibaki and ODM leader, Mr Raila Odinga, to come together to find a lasting solution to the impasse.
McKinnon also said Commonwealth was ready to work with the country "to look at ways of reconstituting ECK along lines of Commonwealth best practice".
He said it was necessary to have a national election management body that was transparent, accountable and enjoys the full confidence of all political contestants.
McKinnon stressed the importance of ensuring the integrity of the election process was beyond question as there were consequences in circumstances where confidence was perceived to be lacking.
"We are deeply saddened and troubled by the incidents of violence in the wake of the elections and large-scale loss of life and displacement of people which followed. This underlines the importance of ensuring that the integrity of the entire process is beyond question."
Their verdict comes behind similar ones by European Union and East African Community.
In its 32-paged report, the Commonwealth Observers Group faulted ECK on its mode of transmitting and announcing the results.
It says the delay in declaring the results resulted in Kenyans experiencing significant concerns about the validity of the results.
"It cannot be acceptable that the ECK process does not ensure accurate and speedy transmission of results to the centre and that they appointed a number of returning officers who failed in their duties," the report says.
Even if the results declared were correct, the report says, the process commencing with the tallying of votes must be considered flawed.
The observer team called on ECK to urgently review the process for transmission and announcement of results.
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