As Kenya approaches the outcome of its closely fought presidential election on Monday, former Minister of Aviation Osita Chidoka has highlighted what he calls “urgent lessons” that the Independent National Electoral Commission must learn from the Kenya polls.

In the presidential election on August 9, 2022, Kenyan Deputy President William Ruto was leading with slightly more than 51% of the vote against his close rival Raila Odinga, who had 48%.

Chidoka wrote on his Facebook page Monday morning, ‘Kenya Presidential Election: Urgent Lessons for INEC,’ that the delay in Kenya’s collation of election results, which could take up to six days, would not bode well for Nigeria.

“As of 6 a.m. Nigerian time, the Kenya Independent Electoral and Boundary Commission had tallied results from 253 out of 291 constituencies, with Ruto leading with 51.18% of votes cast and Raila Odinga trailing with 48.14%,” he said. To win, the winner must receive 50% plus one vote. With 38 constituencies remaining, the IEBC is expected to announce the final result by midday today.”

Chidoka, a former Corps Marshal and Chief Executive of the Federal Road Safety Corps, said that while the upload of polling unit results in Nigeria was an excellent innovation, the country should go further and upload the following: Form EC 8B – Residential Area Ward Collation Results and Form EC 8C – Local Government Collation Results

“After collation and declaration, upload the collated results for the State House of Assembly, House of Representatives, and Senate elections.”

“Before proceeding to Abuja, upload the form EC 8D – state collation results as signed by party agents,” he added.

“The delay in Kenya, where all polling station results have been online since August 11, and collation has taken about six days, does not bode well for Nigeria,” he said.

He stated that while INEC was typically faster than the IEBC, “we are now confronted with a new system where parties can tabulate results from INEC uploads.”

“To improve transparency, the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System backend should automatically collate Polling Unit results at the ward level and print copies for validation and signing by political party ward agents.”

This will “ensure that the result at the backend of the BVAS is consistent with the results on the BVAS tablets,” according to Chidoka.
“This is critical for post-election issues,” he explained.