Kenyan observer group says its projections tally with official results | News

The election monitoring group, comprising civil society groups and faith-based organisations, says its projections tally with Kenyan electoral commission results for the presidency.

Nairobi, Kenya – An independent observer group has said the results of Kenya’s August 9 presidential election as announced by the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC), are in line with its projections.

At a press conference on Tuesday morning in Nairobi, the capital, the Elections Observation Group (ELOG) said over 5,000 observers were deployed across 290 constituencies in the 47 counties.

“Of these, 1000 Parallel Vote Tabulation (PVT) observers were carefully recruited, specially trained and deployed to a nationally representative random sample of polling stations,” Anne Ireri, the group’s chairperson said.

“ELOG’s PVT estimates are consistent with IEBC’s official results for the 2022 presidential elections,” she added. “In light of our assessment of the Election Day processes and given that IEBC figures fall within the projected ranges, the PVT projections, therefore, corroborate the official results.”

The August 9 elections were neck to neck with deputy president William Ruto just edging it over former prime minister Raila Odinga in results announced by IEBC chairperson Wafula Chebukati late on Monday, August 15.

Its projection gave William Ruto 50.7 percent to the IEBC’s 50.49 percent with a margin of error of +/-2.1 percent; for Raila Odinga, it was 48.7 percent for the IEBC’s 48.85 percent with a margin of error of  +/-2.1 percent.

The projections for the two other candidates George Wajackoyah and David Mwaure were 0.44 percent and 0.23 percent respectively, compared to the IEBC’s 0.5 percent and 0.2 percent .

ELOG is a coalition of over a dozen organisations including the Federation of Women Lawyers (FIDA), the Institute for Education in Democracy (IED) think-tank and the influential National Council of Churches in Kenya, an umbrella body for Protestant organisations in the country.

At the press conference, ELOG also said it noted improvements in voting mechanism and transfer of result but that “administrative and external problems persisted such as postponement of some elections” in some areas.

There was controversy before the announcement of the reults on Monday, with four of the IEBC’s seven electoral commissioners leaving the national tallying centre to stage a press conference in another part of Nairobi.

Led by its vice chairperson Juliana Cherera, the quartet said they could not support the “opaque nature” of the final phase. “We cannot take ownership of the result that is going to be announced,” she said, giving no other details.

In response, the ELOG said was also waiting for more details like the public, but was certain its scientific methodology was in order.

“We had ours two days before [IEBC announcement], “ Reverend Elias Agola, a representative of the nonprofit Legal Resources Foundation, another ELOG member, told Al Jazeera. “Looking at our figures, you can see we have a margin of error.”