REVEALED: How people voted multiple times in Jubilee primaries
Details have emerged of how Jubilee Party members managed to vote multiple times in Nairobi despite the strict instructions to returning officers.
There are claims that some voters were erasing the ink and going back to other queues within the same polling stations on the pretext that their names were not in the register.
This despite strict instructions from the Jubilee Party National Elections board Chair Andrew Musangi’s declaration that only the party register would be used to allow Nairobi members to vote.
Agents were in the evening openly canvassing by holding small meetings within the polling station.
In one awkward instance, an agent approached this reporter thinking she was a voter and suggested that she erases the ink and queues again.
This is how the conversation went:
Agent: People are really patient, all these people are waiting to vote this late?
Reporter: They need to exercise their rights and vote in good leaders.
Agent: And have you already voted, you can erase the ink and queue again to vote for my candidate.
Reporter: Isn’t that against the laws?
Agent: You think all these people are genuine; that they haven’t voted?
The conversation prompted a spot check around the polling station and indeed one voter confessed to having voted twice.
“The first time I went in with this jacket using my ID, they checked the register and allowed me to vote. I erased the ink in the middle of my fingers and joined the queue to the other classroom and used my friend’s ID to vote. I told them my name is not in the register and they wrote down the name on the ID and I voted,” said the voter who refused to be identified.
The voter confessed that the holder of the borrowed ID is not even registered in that polling station.
Another voter confessed to having received Sh200 to vote thrice for an aspirant.
“I am jobless so why not take the money and work here today? I know people will say it is the reason we get bad leaders but blame it on the tough times, my children have to eat,” said the voter.
Voting went on into the night for voters who were already queuing by 6pm but due to double voting the queues kept growing longer.
At Moi Avenue Primary School, the presiding officer had to issue numbers to those who were still queuing by 8pm to prevent others from joining the queue.
Starehe aspiring MP Charles Njagua aka Jaguar had on Wednesday stated that his supporters had told him that his opponents’ supporters were double voting.
Jubilee Party’s Musangi said all Nairobi presiding officers had been instructed to only allow those in the party register to vote.
