Doubt
Nyeri ward representatives have called for a re-take of the public participation on the proposed removal from office of Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua through impeachment.
The Members of County Assembly who were led nominated ward rep Kariithi wa Wambui say that they will only trust the credibility of the process when the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) is involved.
The MCA was speaking at the Nyeri Cultural Hall after storming two venues where it is alleged that members of parliament from the county were bribing residents to influence them to support the impeachment motion against the DP. Kariithi told the press that after disrupting the bribery exercise, the suspects fled both scenes leaving behind the fake public views template form that members of the public were supposed to sign.
“We have submitted the papers to the assembly team so that they know that there is massive corruption and rigging and we wanted them to understand that if they wanted people to give views they needed to use a trusted agency, the IEBC.There is no way parliament can play the game and also be the referee,”said Kariithi.
According to the ward representative, under the sixth question where the respondent was supposed to either support or oppose the motion by checking their preferred box, the fake papers bore three options for the respondents. “We had come for a public participation. As we were just about to conclude, we found out there are discrepancies in terms of the forms that were available for signing. You find that some have two options and others have three options, “he said.
“We are worried and we are saying the whole process was a sham and a con game. The National Assembly needs to repeat this exercise and if they are to do any voting let us engage people from the IEBC because it is the only agency we can trust,” added the MCA.
The reassurances from the staff of the National Assembly who were supervising the exercise did very little to change the situation as the MCA decided to authenticate all forms from two carton boxes that had been designated as drop off point. Kariithi also accused the national assembly of failing to inform the public
“A form was recalled by parliament and it means the document was not authentic. The error is from parliament who changed the form but did not inform the public. We are also suspecting there could be a scheme to ensure that a majority of the people who signed these forms signed the one that was recalled,” said Kariithi.
The ward reps have vowed to go to court to petition for the process to be repeated under the supervision of the IEBC.They will also be asking the court to compel the assembly to give information to the public regarding the authentic documents to be used during the fresh exercise.
“We are going to court from here and we will be asking the court to declare that if there is any voting to be done we need the IEBC to be involved because we feel they wanted to bring these papers so that at the end of the day when they are doing the tally, they will influence the outcome,” he said.