KENYA: Electoral commission warns that the possible trial of Kenyan politicians at the International Criminal Court for 2007 election violence poses threat for a repeat of unrest at next year's vote

Record ID: 362258

  • Title: KENYA: Electoral commission warns that the possible trial of Kenyan politicians at the International Criminal Court for 2007 election violence poses threat for a repeat of unrest at next year's vote
  • Date: 18th April 2012
  • Summary: ELDORET, KENYA (2007-FILE) (ORIGINALLY 4:3) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF GRAVE WHERE POST ELECTION VICTIMS WERE BURIED VARIOUS OF IDP CAMP
  • Embargoed: 3rd May 2012 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Kenya, Kenya
  • Country: Kenya
  • Topics: Crime,Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVA9F3SADREFG2RRZ5O2ABLO1LIF
  • Story Text: It's emotions like these that the electoral commission says could threaten Kenya's upcoming polls -- dozens of supporters of suspects facing trial at the International Criminal Court (ICC) took to the streets in late 2010, calling for the chief prosecutor to "leave Kenya alone".
    Next March's election will be the first since a disputed poll in 2007 that triggered a politically-fuelled ethnic slaughter in which more than 1,220 people were killed.
    Ahmed Isaack Hassan, head of the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) that will oversee the vote says the possible trial of Kenyan politicians for election violence is the biggest threat for a repeat of unrest at next year's vote and that he hopes reforms and new technology will ease a "pressure cooker" of tensions.
    "The issue about the ICC and the Hague and the process maybe bring some tensions but it is something that we may need to wait and see how it is going to impact on the elections especially if we are doing elections when the hearing is going on. That is something which I honestly can not predict," he said.
    Leading presidential contenders Uhuru Kenyatta, the former finance minister and son of Kenya's founding president, and William Ruto a former higher education minister, face charges of directing ethnic mobs to murder after the 2007 election, along with other crimes against humanity.
    The charges against Kenyatta, Ruto and two others have shaken a country where the political elite was once seen as almost above the law, and there is concern that, if the presidential hopefuls stand trial and are blocked from running for office, it may trigger fresh violence.
    In January, the ICC ordered Kenyatta, Ruto, radio presenter Joshua arap Sang and the head of the civil service, Francis Muthaura, to stand trial for instigating the violence. The four deny the charges and have appealed the ICC's right to try them.
    Kenyatta and Ruto have forged an alliance against Prime Minister Raila Odinga, who leads in the race according to pollsters, to replace outgoing President Mwai Kibaki.
    Hassan said tribalism was a "cancer" in Kenya and that judicial and electoral reforms included in a new constitution adopted in 2010 as well as new technology should deliver a fair election that would avoid the cycle of bloodletting.
    "When it comes to voting itself, we are not going to to go for electronic voting, we will use ballot paper to vote but when you want to announce the results the transmission will be done electronically. From each of the 27 or so thousand polling centers in the country, they will be transmitting live and in real time to the website of the commission and to Nairobi where we are going to be streaming at the tallying center," he said.
    Previous elections have suffered from claims that votes were interfered with while being transported from polling stations to regional tallying centres.
    The new system, which cost 1 million US dollars to install, uses the 3G data network used by mobile phone companies and was first tried in a 2010 referendum to ratify the constitution.
    Kenya will also switch to an electronic register of voters after ballot boxes at the 2007 elections were found to contain the votes of people who had not registered and even some who were dead.
    In 2007, the tallying of presidential ballots was delayed for days, raising suspicions of ballot rigging.
    Hassan said, under the new constitution, he and other electoral officers could be personally liable for any electoral malpractice, something that should diminish the suspicions of bias levelled at his disgraced predecessor who was blamed for bungling the 2007 vote.
    Having led an African Union team to oversee last year's Nigerian elections, cited by observers as the fairest in decades, Hassan said Kenya had to up its game.
    "Nigeria, Kenya and Zimbabwe were the poster child for bad elections in 2007. When they talks about elections they talk or give examples of Nigeria, Zimbabwe and Kenya; and so Nigeria was out to proof to itself and the world and to Africa that it could better," Hassan said.
    Hassan said he hopes Kenyans learnt a lesson from one of the country's darkest hours. The government still needs to resettle thousands of displaced families who are living in dire conditions four years after being forced from their homes during the violence.
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