An Embu Independent candidate had a stressful Sunday as electoral officials kept him for more than ten hours verifying his supporters’ names and signatures.
Alexander Mundigi reported at the IEBC nomination center
at the Tana and Athi Water Authority’s offices
around 7.30am.
He said he was armed with all the required documents and over 2,500 signatures of supporters endorsing him - 500 more than the legal requirement.
“Imagine I’ve been waiting for verification of my supporters’ names and signatures for more than 10 hours while I was the first aspirant to report here. It has really been torturing but am happy that finally, I’ve got the certificate,” said
Mundigi.
The aspirant said that the IEBC officials who were under the command of the County returning officer Daniel Lenarum verified all the other documents and found them to be acceptable.
Mundigi
said he was however stunned to find himself camping at the offices for over ten hours waiting for verification of the signatures so as to be given a certificate to vie for the seat from the returning officer.
He expressed dissatisfaction that the officers were verifying the supporters and the signatures manually, one after the other to confirm whether they were registered
as voters.
He noted that he thought with the digital era such an exercise would take a few minutes or an hour before he would be issued with the certificate let to go to start his campaign.
He called on the IEBC to ensure that it digitise all its operation to fasten services to the people noting that if there were several other independent senatorial candidates they would not have all been served in a day.
Other senatorial candidates who included former cabinet Minister Njeru Ndwiga (jubilee) former Governor Martin Wambora’s political advisor Joshua Kanake (Maendeleo Chap Chap), former Runyenjes MP Njeru Kathangu and many ward representatives aspirants including former Embu Town mayor Peter Muriithi (Jubilee) came and were cleared as he waited.
Mundigi and the other candidates called for action by the IEBC against candidates who have been bribing voters to support them and asked the commission to keenly monitor the campaigns and block any candidate found compromising voters.
They further asked the IEBC to act on candidates who will be found misusing the youth to cause violence noting that before and during nominations there were cases of violence in the county.
The candidates called for peaceful elections without incitement and inflammatory remarks and division of people along tribal lines.
Ndwiga noted that elections comes and go and whether one wins or lose life should continue.
Kanake asked the voters to elect leaders who would bring in fresh leadership in the county noting that the county has for the last four years been bedevilled by political squabbles which should stop.