An error by a presiding officer did not affect the overall results of Kyuso MCA race in Kitui county, the IEBC has said.
The presiding officer at Katuka nursery school polling station made an error when entering candidates' vote counts on Form 36A
“It was just a mistake by the presiding officer on form 36A. Instead of capturing the votes for one of the candidates as 028, he wrongly put it as 628," said Martin Malonza, the Mwingi North returning officer.
"We detected that error at the constituency tallying centre and made the correct entry on Form 36B.”
He made the statement on Thursday.
He was reacting to claims by David Muema Nduku, an independent who lost to Wiper's Munyoki Mwinzi, that his win was stolen through doctoring of votes.
Nduku, who widely shared an image of the Form 36A, said it was evidence enough that his rival’s votes were fraudulently increased by 600 at the Katuka school polling station.
During last week’s general election, Malonza declared Mwinzi the winner with 2,940 votes while Nduku came in second with 2,883 votes.
Nduku immediately protested that his victory had been stolen.
On Monday Nduku and his supporters held a demonstration at Kamuwongo market and barricaded Mwingi-Kyuso road with burning tyres.
After the demonstration, Nduku shared with the media an image of the Form 36A.
The form indicated 97 voters had turned up out of 133 registered at the polling station.
Nduku has vowed to seek court redress.
But Malonza said the erroneous entry was a simple handwriting error.
He said it would not be a strong basis for Nduku to challenge the declaration of Mwinzi as the MCA for Kyuso.
“If I were to advise Nduku, I would ask him to look for more watertight evidence and not cling onto that simple error that occurred on the Form 36A. After all, it was corrected and the correct number of votes captured on Form 36B,” Malonza said.
Edited by Josephine M. Mayuya
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