Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta snubbed a crisis meeting called by the top election official for yesterday, saying he would instead spend the time campaigning for next week’s presidential vote re-run.
The first presidential vote in August, which Kenyatta won by 1.4mn votes, was annulled by the Supreme Court over procedural irregularities.
The re-run is set for October 26 but opposition leader Raila Odinga has pulled out, alleging a failure to improve oversight of the election, casting doubt on how the vote will proceed.
Election board chairman Wafula Chebukati, in a stark message to political leaders on Wednesday, said he could not guarantee a credible vote under present conditions, and demanded Kenyatta and Odinga meet him for talks.
The board, known as the IEBC, set the meeting for 1130 GMT in Nairobi but then said it had been postponed to an unspecified date and time.
Chebukati later tweeted that he had met Odinga and was “looking forward” to meeting Kenyatta, though it was not clear if the president intended to respond to his call.
Opposition demonstrations, which have led to confrontations between police and protesters, and divisive rhetoric by politicians have stoked uncertainty in Kenya, East Africa’s largest economy and a stable Western ally in a chaotic region.
Speaking at a campaign rally in the western town of Saboti late on Wednesday, Kenyatta said the priority was for Kenyans to go to the polls on the set date.
“We are not interested in telling the IEBC what to do.
We want them to prepare so Kenyans can vote on the 26th,” he said.
However, Odinga, whose call for mass protests on election day has sparked fears that the crisis could turn violent, called for serious talks on the impasse after meeting Chebukati.
Odinga said his withdrawal should force the commission to start a fresh 90-day electoral cycle, including fresh candidate nominations. The election board says the vote will go ahead.
Chebukati’s call for a meeting with the candidates followed the flight of one IEBC commissioner to New York. Roselyn Akombe said she had fled due to threats and said the planned election would amount to a mockery of democracy.
The ruling Jubilee party filed a petition in the Supreme Court yesterday alleging opposition politicians were in contempt of court for obstructing a re-run by withdrawing from the race and by ordering supporters to continue protests including during trainings of election staff in western Kenya.
“The current political climate indeed strikingly resembles the period prior to 2007-2008 post-election violence,” said Francis Ole Kaparo, chair of the National Cohesion and Integration Commission, a government body in charge of preventing hate speech.
Following the disputed 2007 poll, more than 1,200 Kenyans were killed.
Odinga said yesterday he could “reconsider” his decision to quit the country’s troubled election race, provided there was “proper” headway on electoral reform.
“If proper consultations are done and if proper reforms are carried out, and those fears that we raised are addressed, that made us pull out of this race, then we will reconsider,” Odinga said.
“But as it stands right now, our position is (as) we announced it yesterday,” he warned.
Odinga made the remarks after meeting Wafula Chebukati, head of the Kenyan election board, just a week before presidential elections that have plunged the country into a deep crisis.
It will be the second election this year — the supreme court last month overturned the outcome of an initial vote on August 8 that had officially been won by Odinga’s fierce long-term rival, President Uhuru Kenyatta.
The court, in a historic ruling, declared there had been “irregularities” in the counting process and mismanagement by poll officials.
On Wednesday Odinga addressed a rally of thousands of supporters, vowing there would be “no election” and his party would stage massive nationwide rallies on polling day.
“ Protests will go on, on the 26th (there) will be the biggest demonstrations in the whole country,” he said.
Odinga announced last week that he would not take part in the ballot because of problems at Chebukati’s Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC).
But he has yet to formally withdraw his name, a move that would officially give the ground to Kenyatta.
He said “our fears and concerns” about the IEBC had been confirmed by the turn of events the day before, in statements by Chebukati and by an IEBC board member, Roselyn Akombe, who has quit over alleged turmoil in the panel. Both cast doubt on the prospects of a credible election.
“It is now clear to everybody that (a) conducive environment does not exist for a free and fair electoral process,” Odinga said.
On Wednesday, Chebukati urged Odinga and Kenyatta to meet with him to ease tension.
But Kenyatta has refused any postponement of the election and said any “dialogue” should focus on how to ensure that the election proceeds smoothly and peacefully.
“That is the only dialogue that is on the table, an election(...),” he said during a live chat with voters on Facebook.
“We are ready to dialogue at any time on how we will conduct ourselves during the election.”
Kenya’s IEBC has a controversial history.
It presided over a deeply flawed poll in 2007 which triggered violence that killed over 1,100 people.
After elections in 2013, the board was accused of bias, mismanagement and corruption, leading to the resignation of commissioners last year under the pressure of violent protests.
This year’s elections have left 40 people dead — three in recent days and the others in the wake of the August 8 election — mostly at the hands of police according to human rights groups.
Yesterday well-known Kenyan rights activist Boniface Mwangi was beaten by police and shot in the chest with a teargas canister at a protest against police brutality in Nairobi, an AFP photographer witnessed.
Kenyan rights activist, Boniface Mwangi reacts after he was struck with a tear gas canister fired at close range on him by an anti-riot police officer, during a peaceful demonstration against police killings in Nairobi.
