New IEBC needs to revisit Kriegler report

On 16 September 2008, I attended an international news conference convened by renowned South African Judge Johann Kriegler, after a turbulent period in independent Kenya’s history.
Kriegler, now 92, had chaired the Independent Review Commission set up to identify weaknesses and inconsistencies in electoral laws, and to examine the organisational structure, composition and management system of the then Electoral Commission of Kenya.
Last week’s High Court ruling that paved the way for the swearing in of a selection panel that will pick nominees for the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) evoked memories of that presser.
Kriegler made a damning revelation that the IEBC must today deeply reflect upon – that the conduct of the 2007 elections was so materially defective that it was impossible to establish true or reliable results of the elections
Kriegler came to Kenya in the wake of the 2007-2008 post-election violence. The country had witnessed ethnic clashes every election cycle, but the 2007-2008 violence was the worst in the multiparty era.
Kenya had long fallen into the trap of entrenched ethnic divisions fuelled by social and economic exclusion, corruption and the winner-takes-it-all politics that persists to date.
Kriegler was a key player in the National Accord crafted by the Panel of Eminent African Personalities that helped mediate Kenya’s post-2007-2008 election crisis that left 1,300 people dead and 600,000 displaced.
The accord established the coalition government of President Mwai Kibaki and Prime Minister Raila Odinga, which agreed to form commissions to review the elections, violence, and truth and reconciliation.
The outcome was the Kriegler commission on the elections, the Waki commission on the post-election violence and the Truth Justice and Reconciliation Commission. The accord recognised there existed a national crisis that required a political solution.
So, the accord urged a new constitutional review process to build a long-term framework to address the causes of the post-election national crisis and identified six critical areas to be holistically addressed.
These were constitutional, institutional and legal reform, land reform, poverty, inequality and regional imbalances, unemployment among the youth, national consolidation and unity, transparency, accountability and impunity.
Sadly, the 2010 Constitution has been manipulated, sidelining wananchi’s participation in governance through democratic, free and fair elections, shattering hopes of attaining the noble objectives of the accord that midwifed it.
As the Kriegler report declared (with a comparative analysis of Kenya’s and Ghana’s electoral processes), to conduct democratic, lawful elections, the national electoral commission must be in place and fully operational at least two years before the election date. Unlike Ghana, Kenya was way off the mark then, as it is now.
The delay in reconstituting the IEBC is a looming danger that poses serious electoral and credibility questions. Kenya must draw lessons from Ghana – which again held successful elections recently – on consolidating and deepening democracy.
Despite similar socio-political and economic conditions and simultaneous democratic reforms, scholars classify Ghana as “consolidating democracy” while labelling Kenya a “hybrid regime”.
Overhauling and restructuring the IEBC is mandatory to restore public confidence in the electoral process. Procurement of election technology systems and balloting materials should exclude all vendors in the 2012, 2017 and 2022 elections from the 2027 election.
The IEBC must be radically transformed to deliver free, fair, transparent, accountable and credible elections. The reverse could mean rolling back all the democratic gains Kenya has made in strengthening governance and human rights, rendering advances made so far impotent.
The writer comments on national affairs; [email protected] . — The writer is dean, School of Communication, Daystar University