A wagoner was driving a heavy load along a muddy road. He came to a part of the road where the wheels sank halfway into the mire, and the more the horses pulled, the deeper sank the wheels.
So the wagoner threw down his whip, knelt down and prayed to Hercules. But Hercules appeared to him and said: “Don’t sprawl there. Get up and put your shoulder to the wheel.”
There is nothing that beats proper preparations but even more important is the need to pull your weight on the task given to you.
In 2007, we can all remember the vivid images of the then Electoral Commission of Kenya chairman Samuel Kivuitu fumbling, making haphazard pronouncements and hurriedly announcing the win of President Mwai Kibaki that thereafter triggered the post-election violence.
That is a period that we all wish we could forget after 1,500 Kenyans were killed in the violence and another 600,000 were evicted from their homes. It dented Kibaki’s near-perfect presidency and many can never forget about that.
The mismanagement of the 2007 election had a direct influence on the violence that was witnessed. Had the electoral commission done a better job, then our nation's history would have probably been different.
In 2017, the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission, which was appointed that January for the August election that year, made major blunders that eventually led to the nullification of the presidential election.
Some of the mistakes by the IEBC included not following its own procedures on various aspects of the electoral process. For instance, the electoral technology that was required by law was not tested early enough and eventually failed.
Some of the aspects of technology that failed was the electronic transmission of the results. The IEBC ended up relying on text messages and photographs of the manually tallied forms.
We also remember that some of the forms provided by the IEBC did not have serial numbers or other security features. We even had cases where instead of barcodes, the forms had lines and numbers that couldn’t pass the test of barcodes.
Last week, Chief Justice Martha Koome stated that the IEBC must state what they have done to improve on their structures to ensure that we do not have a repetition of 2017 where the Supreme Court will have no option but to nullify the election.
However, as IEBC chairman Wafula Chebukati said on Saturday, it is important for all stakeholders to stop casting aspersions on the IEBC and use formal channels to engage the commission.
That said, we must commend the IEBC for the work that it is doing so far. It is important to give credit where it's due and the IEBC has so far conducted everything above board and has kept Kenyans well updated on the election.
The commission has stuck to timelines strictly and managed the election preparedness professionally. It has continued to engage stakeholders across the board to ensure that everyone is not only aware of what is happening but they are also involved in every step of the process.
On Saturday, the IEBC made a landmark decision where it disqualified former Nairobi Governor Mike Sonko and former Kiambu CEC Karungo wa Thang'wa for having been impeached for not complying with Chapter Six of the Constitution.
This is a great step to ensuring that we give life to high standards of integrity in leadership in Kenya. We must ensure that the country has proper leadership that rides on high integrity.
The IEBC should ride on the gains made so far and ensure that the lessons from the last election are used to make this year's election secure and delivered in a free and fair manner. Previously, we have not had an electoral commission manage an election with the experience that the IEBC currently has, especially at the top leadership.
Chebukati has a momentous opportunity of taking this nation through a peaceful election by conducting an election free from interests, corruption and rigging. This IEBC has the opportunity of going down in history as the commission that delivered an election that was not contested.
Political and communications consultant. @MachelWaikenda
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