Azimio Holds IEBC Ransom Amid Internal Conflicts and Gender Imbalance in Hiring Panel Row
President William Ruto may not appoint the team responsible for hiring the next Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) commissioners soon.
The minority party, Azimio, faces internal conflicts that have hindered them from selecting a nominee for the nine-member panel.
This issue has prevented the Parliamentary Service Commission (PSC) from forwarding the nominees’ list to the President.
The deadline for nominating agencies to submit their representatives to the PSC expired on July 29.
Although the Political Parties Liaison Committee (PPLC) nominated Augustus Muli to represent the coalition, the council rejected his nomination.
Azimio Secretary General Junet Mohamed indicated in a letter to the PSC that the PPLC list does not meet the gender balance requirement.
The IEBC Amendment Act 2024 mandates that the PPLC ensure a gender balance among its nominees.
However, the PPLC nominated three men: Evans Misati, Nicodemus Bore, and Augustus Muli.
Azimio, through Junet, has requested the PSC to replace Augustus with Koki Muli from the Wiper party to achieve gender balance.
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“The coalition decided to nominate Koki Muli Grignon from the Wiper Democratic Movement as the most suitable and competent candidate and formally submitted her name to the registrar of political parties for transmission to the PPLC for endorsement,” the letter states.
Junet criticized the PPLC’s endorsement of three men, highlighting it as a violation of IEBC laws regarding gender diversity.
The selection panel’s formation is seen as the initial step in addressing the constitutional crisis caused by a non-functional electoral commission.
Currently, the IEBC lacks commissioners since chairman Wafula Chebukati and commissioners Boya Molu and Abdi Guliye retired in January last year.
Four other commissioners—Juliana Cherera, Francis Wanderi, Justus Nyang’aya, and Irene Masit—were removed for rejecting Ruto’s presidential election.
Due to the ongoing conflict within the PPLC, the situation is expected to persist, frustrating constituencies and wards without representatives.
The PSC holds the key to resolving the crisis at the electoral commission, which has impeded the constitutionally mandated boundary review every 12 years.
Once established, the panel will invite Kenyans to apply for the chairman and commissioner positions and shortlist candidates for interviews.
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However, this process has yet to commence.
The PSC has urged the PPLC to address the issue promptly. In a letter dated July 29, commission secretary Jeremiah Nyegenye requested the PPLC to resolve the gender balance issue.
“The three nominees you have forwarded are all of the same gender and therefore not in compliance with sub-paragraph 2c of the First Schedule of the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (Amendment) Act, 2024,” Nyegenye wrote.
He also noted the Azimio la Umoja coalition’s objections to the nomination.
The IEBC law stipulates that nominating agencies must ensure that no more than two-thirds of their nominees are of the same gender.
Besides the gender issue, Azimio argues that Augustus’ National Liberal Party is not a parliamentary party and that he was deemed unsuitable by the coalition.
“The nominee ostensibly representing the Azimio coalition was rejected by the coalition for lacking the necessary qualifications and credentials,” Junet said.
However, Augustus has refuted these claims and plans to challenge the decision, including seeking legal redress. He has obtained a court order preventing his removal, with a hearing scheduled for August 15.
“They are shortchanging me because they think ‘wao ni viongozi’ (they are leaders). This is unacceptable,” Augustus said at Lion Place on Wednesday after meeting with the Office Of the Registrar Of Political Parties.
Augustus contends that he won the coalition’s nomination fairly during a vote conducted by the IEBC in the presence of the ORPP.
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He stated that the registrar oversaw the entire process, during which he secured 16 votes compared to Koki’s seven.
“We’ll fight this to the end. We will go to court to ensure justice is served. We cannot allow them to rig this process. If the rigging starts with the team hiring IEBC commissioners, is this the culture we want to establish in the team being formed?” Augustus asked.
He suggested that the group could have easily chosen a woman from the list of non-parliamentary parties within the PPLC.
Lilian Gor, he said, also defeated Koki in the race and was thus best suited for the third slot.
It has emerged that the majority party nominated two men while the minority had Augustus and Koki as its top two nominees.
According to the new law, the PSC has two slots in the panel, three for political parties under the PPLC, two for the inter-religious council, and one each for the Institute of Certified Public Accountants of Kenya (ICPAK) and the Law Society of Kenya (LSK).
So far, only three slots have been successfully filled without challenge.
ICPAK nominated Tanui Andrew Kipkoech as its representative.
The Inter-religious Council nominated Nelson Makanda of the Evangelical Alliance of Kenya and Fatma Saman of the National Muslim Leaders Forum.
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The nominees for the LSK and PSC have not been revealed yet. The PSC met on Tuesday but did not reach a conclusive decision.
Members contacted by The Star for updates referred the writer to National Assembly Speaker Moses Wetang’ula, the commission’s chairperson.
The Speaker had not responded by the time of publication regarding the ongoing row that threatens to extend the IEBC crisis.
Last week, he stated that the electoral agency’s selection panel was to be gazetted by Tuesday, July 30, to start recruiting new commissioners. Despite these assurances, nothing has materialized.
Even though the hiring panel has not yet been established, experts believe that the new framework may not resolve the commission’s operational issues.
IEBC operations have recently been disrupted by conflicts between the secretariat and the commissioners.
This issue was evident in the 2017 general election when significant disagreements arose between Chebukati and then-CEO Ezra Chiloba.
The conflict centered on whether the secretariat or the commissioners should handle critical procurements at the electoral commission.
The Judiciary, Kenya Law Reform Commission, IEBC secretariat, the outgoing IEBC selection panel, and some election experts believe the new law needs further review and revision.
Azimio Holds IEBC Ransom Amid Internal Conflicts and Gender Imbalance in Hiring Panel Row
