ANC leader Musalia Mudavadi has backed a proposal by Cord and the Treasury to use national ID cards, as the only requirement to vote.
Mudavadi said yesterday the making of a voters’ register from the Registrar of Persons database is a workable idea. “The suggestion is extremely appealing,” he said.
Cord experts led by lawyer Paul Mwangi made a submission to Parliament’s Joint Select Committee on Electoral Reforms that the voters’ register be compiled from the national ID card database and the ID card be used as a voters’ card.
Treasury CS Henry Rotich had earlier submitted to the committee a similar proposal. He said ID cards have been used successfully in Mexico for voter registration.
Mudavadi said the proposal, if adopted, will save the country billions of shillings in voter registration and eliminate double registration and ghost voters. “Nonetheless, we could give the idea a trial run and apply the system to clean the existing register,” he said. He said every Kenyan should only have one identity number for all transactions.
