KENYA: Kisumu residents say will accept results of presidential vote

Record ID: 362529

  • Title: KENYA: Kisumu residents say will accept results of presidential vote
  • Date: 9th March 2013
  • Summary: KISUMU, KENYA (MARCH 9, 2013) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF TRAFFIC AND PEOPLE WALKING IN TOWN VARIOUS OF NEWSPAPER HEADLINES
  • Embargoed: 24th March 2013 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Kenya
  • Country: Kenya
  • Topics: Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVA4P10DCGLJMI6XWYB2OSDEZ8UO
  • Story Text: The son of Kenya's founding president, Uhuru Kenyatta, won the presidential election by a tiny margin with 50.03 percent, provisional results showed on Saturday (March 9), avoiding a run-off after a race that has divided the nation along tribal lines.
    While tension has been rising In the city of Kisumu, the biggest in the heartland of Kenyatta's rival Prime Minister Raila Odinga, all was calm on Saturday morning as residents waited for the official results.
    Kisumu was a flashpoint for violence during the disputed 2007 presidential vote that unleashed tribal blood-letting.
    Resident Denis Bungeni said he didn't expect a repeat of the conflict of five years ago.
    "From what we had in 2007, people had experience and I don't expect that, because right now people are sober-minded, they know what are the consequences of the clashes. So I don't think there'll be clashes, and Kisumu right now is peaceful I think and people are prepared to get a positive or a negative result," he said.
    Pino Mumbo, said he would accept the election result as long as it was credible.
    "I do trust it. In my opinion, I do trust it but what I can doubt is concerning what IEBC said in the first place of the voters turnout," he said, referring to the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission.
    "In the first place, they said the voters turnout was around 70 percent, as per now we are seeing the voting has gone beyond twelve million, that is already above 70 percent so what they have to say is to go and confirm from those status, so if somebody does not think that, he has to go to court to argue about those figures concerning the 70 percent at now, which it has passed over 70, it is now beyond 90," he added.
    Kenyatta faces trial for crimes against humanity after the 2007 violence.
    If he is declared the winner by the election commission, which has still to announce the official result, Kenya will become the second African country after Sudan to have a sitting president indicted by the International Criminal Court.
    International observers broadly said the vote and count had been transparent so far and the electoral commission, which replaced an old, discredited body, promised a credible vote.
    To secure an outright win a candidate needed more than 50 percent of the votes. Kenyatta, the deputy prime minister, achieved that but with a margin of just 4,100 of the more than 12.3 million votes cast.
    The first-round win, which must be officially confirmed by the IEBC means Kenyans who waited five days for the vote result will not now face a second round that would have prolonged uncertainty.
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