Kenya is facing a political crisis following last week’s presidential election. On Monday, the chair of Kenya’s election commission announced Deputy President William Ruto had won the election after winning 50.5% of the vote. But four of the seven members on the election commission have disavowed Ruto’s victory and are critiquing how the votes were counted.
it’s not so much that people are questioning the results, but people are questioning the outcome of the results. And that’s an important nuance just because of the history of Kenyan elections. We’ve had very heavily contested elections for the last 30 years, starting in 1992, and there’s always been a reason to doubt the results because of interference by the electoral commission, by the people who are in power. And, you know, the one that — the round that people might be most familiar with, the 2007 round, that led to violence, there’s — elections have just always come under a cloud of misunderstanding, misrepresentation, intimidation, the electoral commission not rising to the occasion, results being interfered with.
And so there was a great deal of expectation, really, that after six cycles — as I said, beginning in 1992 — that the electoral commission might be able to deliver a result that wasn’t shrouded in, you
— source democracynow.org | Aug 19, 2022