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2KEN014/235 – Strengthening Electoral Processes in Kenya
Quarterly Report (April - June 2017)
Project Summary Country: Project Duration: Project Budget: Donors:
Kenya 2015 – 2018 US$ 23,713,800 DfID = US$ 5,768,584 USAID = US$ 3,800,000 EU = US$ 5,700,000 Ireland= US$ 106,157 Italy = US$ 1,060,445
Annual Budget for 2017: Expenditure for 2017:
US$ 7,233,000 US$ 3,908,076
Contact Persons: David Maina Team Leader, Democratic Governance UNDP Kenya [email protected]
Ekitela Lokaale Project Manager a.i., SEPK UNDP Kenya [email protected]
Responsible partners
Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission Judiciary Committee on Elections Office of the Registrar of Political Parties Political Parties Dispute Tribunal
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Table of Contents
Abbreviations ....................................................................................................................... 3
Executive Summary ............................................................................................................. 5
1. Progress towards Development Results .................................................................... 9
2. Targeting, Sustainability of Results, Strengthening National Capacities and South-South and Triangular Cooperation ............................................................................ 28
3. Partnerships ................................................................................................................ 28
4. Strengthening National Capacities ............................................................................ 29
5. Monitoring and Evaluation ........................................................................................ 30
6. Knowledge Management .......................................................................................... 31
7. Implementation Challenges and Lessons Learned................................................... 33
8. Gender and Conflict Sensitivity ................................................................................. 34
9. Analysis of Risk and Issues ......................................................................................... 36
10. Financial Report .......................................................................................................... 41
11. Annexes ...................................................................................................................... 42
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Abbreviations
AVEW Annual Voter Education Week
AWP Annual Work Plan
BRIDGE Building Resources in Democracy, Governance and Elections
BVR Biometric Voter Registration
CTA Chief Technical Advisor
DaO Delivering as One
EDR Electoral Dispute Resolution
EDG Elections Donor Group
EGBV Electoral Gender Based Violence
EISA Electoral Institute for Sustainable Democracy in Africa
EOP Election Operations Plan
ESAP Electoral Security Arrangement Programme
ETAP Elections Technical Assistance Provider
EU European Union
GEWE Gender Equality and Women Empowerment
ICC International Criminal Court
ICT Information Communications Technology
IEBC Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission
IFES International Federation of Electoral Systems
IIEC Interim Independent Electoral Commission
IP Implementing Partner
IRCK Inter-Religious Council of Kenya
JCE Judiciary Committee on Elections
JPSC Joint Parliamentary Select Committee
JTI Judiciary Training Institute
KEAP Kenya Electoral Assistance Programme
KCO Kenya Country Office
KICD Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development
KISM Kenya Institute of Supplies Management
KNCHR Kenya National Commission on Human Rights
KSL Kenya School of Law
MVR Mass Voter Registration
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M&E Monitoring and Evaluation
MCK Media Council of Kenya
MoU Memorandum of Understanding
NCIC National Cohesion and Integration Commission
NDI National Democratic Institute
NGEC National Gender and Equality Commission
NSA Non-State Actor
NPS National Police Service
NSC National Steering Committee on Peace Building and Conflict Management
OHCHR Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights
ORPP Office of the Registrar of Political Parties
PWDs Persons with Disabilities
PMU Project Management Unit
PP Political Party
PPLC Political Parties Liaison Committee
PPDT Political Parties Dispute Tribunal
ProDoc Project Document
PSC Project Steering Committee
RRF Results and Resource Framework
SEPK Strengthening Electoral Processes in Kenya
SERP Support to Electoral Reform and Processes
ToT Training of Trainers
TWG Technical Working Group
UNDAF United Nations Development Assistance Framework
UNDP United Nations Development Programme
UNODC United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime
UNV United Nations Volunteer
UN Women United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women
VRAs Voter Registration Assistants
WSR Women Situation Room
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Executive Summary
Project background
The Strengthening Electoral Processes in Kenya (SEPK) project seeks to contribute to Kenya’s effort to develop sustainable electoral institutions that can deliver a free, fair, just, transparent and credible general election in 2017 through the following four outcomes:
(i) Strengthened institutional and legal framework for the conduct and management of free, fair, just, transparent and credible elections;
(ii) Strengthened participation of voters, parties and candidates in the electoral process with emphasis on women, youth, persons with disabilities and marginalized groups;
(iii) Delivery of more efficient, transparent and peaceful elections, and (iv) Strengthened electoral justice and increased compliance with the electoral legal
framework. The project is implemented by UNDP in collaboration with United Nations Agency for Gender Equality and Women Empowerment (UN Women) and the Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights (UNOHCR) under the United Nations principle of Delivering as One (DaO) and the United Nations Policy Directive on Principles and types of UN Electoral Assistance.
Social political environment
The 2017 General Elections will be held on August 8, 2017. Kenyans will cast their votes for six elective positions in the country’s second General Election under the Constitution of Kenya 2010. The Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) and other relevant stakeholders have continued to make arrangements for the conduct of the elections. Political party primaries were completed during the quarter. The primaries were conducted in April and May 2017. With support from SEPK, the KNCHR deployed 84 human rights monitors to 291 counties to monitor the primaries. The commission thereafter published a report which revealed that the primaries were marred by irregularities such as delays in supply of polling materials, incomplete registers, bribery, use of violence, intimidation, ballot stuffing, and targeted attacks on marginalized groups (including women).2 The party primaries exposed low levels of party preparedness and at this time raised doubts over capabilities of political party’s foster internal democracy and undertake free and fair nominations. The ability in this respect for special interest groups including women to participate fairly in party democracy came under great scrutiny. The 2017 General Elections will be a high stakes election, evidenced by the high number of candidates who have offered themselves for elections. In total, some 15,082 candidates were vying for various positions: 19 for president, 246 for governor, 349 for senator, 330 for women member of national assembly, 2,078 for member of national assembly and 12,060 for member of county assembly. Out of these, 3,752 (24.88%) are independent candidates. This unprecedented high number of independent candidates may be attributed to the observed challenges in the conduct of the political party primaries. It is also linked to the growing interest in various elective
1 Bungoma, Kakamega, Kisii, Migori, Siaya, Tana River, Lamu, Kwale, Garissa, Marsabit, Turkana, Mandera, Isiolo, Samburu, Baringo, Nakuru,Kirinyaga Meru, Laikipia, Elgeyo Marakwet, Uasin Gishu, Nandi, Kericho, Bomet, Narok, Nairobi, Kiambu and Murang’a, Kisumu. 2 See KNCHR, “The fallacious vote: A Human rights account of the 2017 political parties primaries”, May 2017
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positions, especially gubernatorial and county assembly positions. During the quarter, political campaigns kicked off in earnest. The Official campaigns started on 28 May 2017 with the presidential candidates submitting their credentials for nomination to the IEBC. Key campaign issues started to shape up around performance of the current regime, allegations of corruption and misappropriation of public resources; infrastructure penetration; food security; health, and education. The Campaign Financing Act which sought to regulate and track the use of resources for campaigns was suspended by the National Assembly and would only start being applicable for the 2022 GE. Parliament amended the Elections Act to allow the government to advertise its key achievements within the campaign period. Some key stakeholders objected to the amendments, arguing that they would pave way for use of public resources in electoral campaigns by the incumbent administration disguised as advertisement of government achievements.3 Sixty-three political parties signed the Electoral Code of Conduct. The code of conduct sets standards of behavior of political parties during elections. The code binds the Government and every political party, leader, office bearer, agent and member of a political party or a person who supports a political party, and every candidate nominated under the electoral laws for any election. The code of conduct seeks to promote conditions conducive to the conduct of free and fair elections and a climate of tolerance in which political activity may take place without fear, coercion, intimidation or reprisals. In the quarter under review, preparations for the 2017 elections continued against a backdrop of high profile court cases challenging various aspects of the electoral process. The Opposition and civil society instituted a case seeking a determination by courts that results declared at the polling station and tallied the constituency tallying center were final and conclusive. The High court ruled in favour of the Opposition, prompting the IEBC to lodge an appeal which was dismissed by the Court of Appeal.4 The Opposition also sued the IEBC over the direct sourcing of Al Ghurair Company for printing of presidential ballots, citing among other things, alleged close links between the company and Jubilee presidential candidate, H.E. Uhuru Kenyatta.5 Whereas these cases gave courts the opportunity to elaborate the electoral legal framework further, the litigation unfortunately contributed to legal uncertainty in preparations of the elections, now about one month away. Several key events brought to public understanding the level of electoral preparedness by key electoral stakeholders. IEBC convened the National Elections Conference (NEC), where the state of electoral preparedness was the subject of debate and scrutiny. The Judiciary announced its readiness to handle elections petitions and promulgated regulations to that effect. The National Police Service in conjunction with the police launched the Electoral Security Arrangements Programme (ESAP) as part of the process of securing the elections. During this period, there was also notable incidences of insecurity in parts of North Rift (Baringo and Laikipia) and terrorist attacks in North Eastern and Coast regions, creating an appearance of a complex post electoral security situation that had the potential of affecting how the elections would be conducted. Commentary about the non-commencement of IEBC’s mass voter education campaigns also
3 See KNCH, “KNCHR advisory brief on the Elections Offences (Amendment) Bill, 2017” issues on 14th June 2017 and available on http://www.knchr.org/Portals/0/OccasionalReports/KNCHR%20ADVISORY%20BRIEF%20ON%20THE%20ELECTION%20OFFENCES.pdf?ver=2017-06-14-125843-593 4 Independent and Electoral Boundaries Commission v Maina Kiai Court of Appeal Civil No. 105 of 2017 5 NASA & 2 others v IEBC & 3 others, JR No 378 of 2017
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appeared to undermine the state of preparedness. Public confidence in state of electoral preparedness by key actors nevertheless remained significantly high, pointing to the success of some of the efforts alluded hereto. For instance, public confidence in IEBC increased from 38%6 in December 2016 to 66.2%7 in April 2017. The IEBC experienced critical internal challenges within the Quarter under review that were pertinent to the context of elections. In April, the press reported a row between the Commissioners and the Secretariat over transfer of returning officers ahead of the elections.8 In May, the Commission suspended the ICT senior official over claims of sabotage.9 In June, the Commission suspended the procurement director over accusations of interfering with ballots tender processes.10 Even though the IEBC was able to address these issues using its internal mechanisms, the issues surrounding the occurrences presented a challenge on state of preparedness of the Commission ahead of the elections. The cost of living escalated within the quarter, largely due to food shortages occasioned by the ongoing drought situation, earlier declared a national disaster in February. The opposition used this as a campaign issue, rallying supporters with the promise of bringing down the cost of living upon getting elected. The government responded to the situation by introducing subsidized maize flour to alleviate the shortage and high cost of the staple food. This whole saga brought to fore the possibility of the presidential election assuming issue-based campaign platforms centered around economic performance and cost of living.
Programmatic Results
In quarter two of 2017, the Project focused on supporting the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) to implement legal and administrative reforms recommended by the Joint Parliamentary Select Committee on matters relating to the IEBC11. These reforms included the onboarding of new IEBC Commissioners. Key priorities of IEBC under the EOP within this period included political party primaries and nomination of candidates, electoral preparedness training of Returning Officers and other electoral officials, procurement of ballot papers, launch of electoral security arrangements programme (ESAP), voter education, voter registration, and preparation for effective electoral dispute resolution mechanism.
The Project made progress in respect of institutional strengthening of the IEBC. This included facilitating induction of the new Commissioners; finalization of key policies, procedures and systems for the IEBC and the Office of the Registrar of Political Parties; training of women, youth and persons with disabilities to be electoral trainers and election monitors; deployment of both short term electoral observers (Under the ELOG umbrella and the KNCHR) and finalization and piloting of voter training materials with key stakeholders. Electoral Security Arrangement
6 Opinion poll released by Ipsos Synovate in December 2016 7 Opinion poll released by Infotrack Harris in April 2017 8 See http://www.nation.co.ke/news/Dispute-over-transfers-threaten-to-split-IEBC/1056-3908526-56oaw0/index.html last accessed on 12th August 2017 9 https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/article/2001241233/iebc-director-for-ict-james-muhati-sent-on-compulsory-leave-over-claims-of-sabotage last accessed on 12th August 2017 10 See http://www.the-star.co.ke/news/2017/06/07/iebc-fires-procurement-director-over-ballot-tender_c1575518 last accessed on 12th August 2017 11 For more information on the Joint Select Committee on matters relating to the IEBC, visit http://parliament.go.ke/the-national-assembly/news-and-events/item/2922-the-joint-select-committee-on-matters-relating-to-the-independent-electoral-and-boundaries-commission-iebc-concludes-and-tables-its-report-in-both-houses?highlight=YToxOntpOjA7czo2OiJyZXBvcnQiO30= (last accessed on 16 May 2017)
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Programme (ESAP) and various initiatives aimed at enhancing women participation in 2017 General Elections were rolled out; while engagement with the Judiciary through the Judiciary Training Institute and Political Parties Dispute Tribunal (PPDT) to prepare for electoral dispute resolution was enhanced.
Challenges and Lessons learnt
During the reporting period, the project contended with the following implementation challenges and the attendant lessons learnt:
The effects of late onboarding of IEBC Commissioners (in January 2017) continued to be felt throughout the quarter. The commissioners had to contend with a busy schedule and this led to some postponement of some critical project activities e.g. sensitization of commissioners on risk matrix and validation of policies developed with SEPK support.
Unwillingness by political parties to comply with electoral laws; equal focus on political parties’ strengthening is required to promote a culture of compliance during the electoral cycle
Procurement obstacles and Litigation risks that could impact on electoral operations; public procurement oversight reforms are necessary in the post-election period
Delays in a coordinated rolling-out of massive voter education campaigns by IEBC; improved coordination among voter education providers is necessary to address delays and reasons thereof, whenever the such arise.
Inadequate stakeholder buy-in for Women Situation Room intervention; adequate stakeholder engagement at the level of conceptualization is necessary to ensure sufficient buy-in
Mismatched demand for electoral justice with available capacity at Political Parties Dispute Tribunal (PPDT): there is need for continuous capacity support for the PPDT
It is however important to note that the above challenges were in many ways connected to the
At the project level, the following challenges and lessons learnt were observed during the period:
Congested and conflicting activity schedules at IEBC which led to delays in implementation and crowding-out of some key areas of support: close monitoring of the elections calender is important to facilitate better responses to congested activity schedules
Delays in signing of letter of agreement with the Judiciary which delayed implementation of some election dispute resolution activities: negotiations towards signing of such agreements should be done at the commencement of the project
operationalization of the working arrangement on electoral dispute resolution and low project visibility may have affected the pace and rate of activity implementation.
Finances
The total resource requirement for the project is US$ 24,018,800. With a commitment of US$ 16,382,584 million, the project has a funding gap of US$ 7,636,216. This requires the project to scale up its resource mobilization efforts to bridge the funding gap. Interrogation on viability of this option few weeks to the elections nonetheless is happening.
The project is implementing an annual work plan (AWP) for 2017 with a total budget of US$ 7,233,000. As at June 30, 2017, the project had spent US$ 3,908,076 making the delivery stand at 54% against the 2017 annual work plan.
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1. Progress towards Development Results
CPD Outcome 1: By 2017 Kenya has a democracy in which human rights & gender equality are respected; elected officials are responsive & accountable; citizens & civil society are empowered, responsible & politically/socially engaged; equitable representation is achieved through affirmative action; & the electoral processes are free, fair, transparent & peaceful.
Project Outcome 1: Legal and institutional framework for free, fair, credible, transparent and peaceful 2017 General Elections established
CPD output targets
Project output targets Summary achievement in the second quarter
Status
2017 Elections are credible and peaceful
2 elections legislation and regulations reviewed and enacted
Regulations for preparation and submission of political party lists published; Party lists regulations disseminated to party boards and secretaries-general
Achieved
2 laws produced in popular versions and translated into Swahili
Discussions held by the National Council for Law Reporting (NCLR) to produce pocket size compendium of electoral laws; Procurement of ICs to develop popular versions of Political Parties Act commenced and is ongoing
Not achieved
Legislative drafting and legal research capacity of IEBC strengthened
Workshop for IEBC external lawyers - capacity to handle petitions; Ongoing support provided by 2 UNVs attached to IEBC legal directorate
Achieved
1 IEBC policy put in place Draft Social Media (Digital) policy strategy drafted . Awaiting IEBC and SEPK validation
On going
Real-time tracking of implementation of EOP
System for EOPs tracking in place. Progress reports being produced and used to inform strategic shifts in implementation
On going
3 ORPP policies, procedures and systems put in place and strengthened
Political party nomination rules and guidelines; Procurement to produce popular versions of Political Parties Act in English and Swahili ongoing
Not achieved
Support to IEBC strategic communications
Communications strategy for IEBC produced; Media owners and the donor community engaged on the work of the Commission; Digital media strategy for the 2017 GE finalized; One-on-one training for commissioners on media appearance undertaken; Targeted messaging for various audiences, including university students, produced and disseminated.
Achieved
Robust warehousing and logistics framework developed
Logistics and warehousing support to IEBC. Improved receiving and dispatch of electoral materials; IEBC prepared to handle and dispatch (Dispatch and retrieval plans) the ballot papers to be received in July 2017
On going
800 staff trained in pre- 434 male and 355 female officers trained Partially
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election logistics and operations
in pre-election logistics and elections operations.
achieved
Overall Status On-going
Output 1.1 – Legal framework for elections strengthened
IEBC supported to publish regulations on party lists and sensitize political parties on the party lists: UNDP supported IEBC to publish regulations for generation and submission of party nomination lists as required by Article 90 of the Constitution12. UNDP support contributed to IEBC’s engagement of parties’ National Elections Board and Secretaries - General. This enabled the IEBC to provide guidance in preparation of party lists and allocation of special seats for the National Assembly, the Senate and the County Assemblies. The law requires a fair balance between gender, ethnicity and geographical representation in addition to the inclusion of youth. Compliance on this law will support representation of marginalized group in leadership. Political parties were required to submit the lists of their nominated candidates before the 24 June 2017 deadline. NGEC issued an advisory that they will go to court to block any party list that does not meet the inclusion principle.
However, only 10% of the lists submitted to IEBC complied with the law.13 Most parties disregarded requirements for nomination of marginalized groups (youth and PWDs). Despite sensitization of political parties, such low level of compliance points to an entrenched culture of impunity within political parties. There is need for sustained engagement with political parties to foster respect of law and fidelity to the principles underlining the idea of party lists.
Legislative drafting and legal research capacity of IEBC strengthened: Through two UN Volunteers (UNVs) embedded in the legal directorate, UNDP supported legislative drafting and legal research capacity of IEBC. The UNVs were instrumental in providing support to the IEBC in providing technical guidance to political parties in drawing up the party lists and in resolution of disputes arising out of political party primaries and enforcement of the Electoral Code of Conduct. Through this support, disputes relating to the nomination process that were lodged at IEBC were effectively handled.
During the quarter, UNDP supported the sensitization of IEBC external and internal legal teams14. The capacity building sessions with IEBC’s in house and external lawyers sought to identify possible areas of post-poll disputes; undertake scenario building on preparedness and; development of election petition defense strategies. Further, the Commission sought to sensitize lawyers as to new electoral laws and elections technology hence equipping them towards effective handling of cases arising out of the electoral legal framework.
12 In addition to the national values and principles of governance and the general principles for the electoral system, Article 90 of the Constitution, sections 34-37 of the Elections Act, 2011 as amended by The Elections (Amendment) (No. 2) Act, 2012, The Election Laws (Amendment) Act, 2016 and The Election Laws (Amendment) Act, 2017. The Regulations 54-56 of The Election (General) Regulations, 2012 as amended by The Election (General) (Amendment) Regulations 2017and The Elections (Party Primaries and Party Lists) Regulations, 2017 prescribe minimum stipulations for submission of Party Lists. 13 Source- IEBC legal officer 14 Following the 2013 General Elections, the courts, in accordance with the constitutional and statutory timelines, concluded all petitions within six months. 188 petitions were filed. 24 of these were allowed, 115 were dismissed, 32 were struck out and 17 were withdrawn by the Petitioners. Experience in handling of the 2013 petitions served as a base line for lesson learning in preparation for petitions expected to arise from the 2017 general elections.
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Figure 1: Animated EoP election timeline tracking tool developed under the project
Implementation of the two-thirds gender principle: Under the leadership of UN Women, SEPK has been tracking implementation of the constitutional principle that not more than two thirds of all elective positions shall be held by persons of the same gender15. The 2/3rds gender principle legislation is yet to be enacted. Various advocacy efforts were made by stakeholders such as civil society, women’s movement, National Gender Equality Commission (NGEC) supported by UN Women and others to push for enacting the law, nonetheless these were not successful. On 29th March 2017, the Constitutional Court directed Parliament and the Attorney General to enact requisite legislation to facilitate implementation of the two-thirds gender rule in 60 days. That said, the law has not been passed. This will likely result in a constitutional crisis that will likely lead to a challenge as to the composition of the next Parliament for failure to comply to this mandatory constitutional principle. Without this law in place, it now falls upon the electorate to elect minimum one-third of women in the 2017 elections. This result is highly unlikely examining the previous patterns of Kenya’s electoral process. NGEC has released an advisory in respect of a looming potential constitutional crisis. SEPK-supported civil society organizations (CSOs) including CRAWN Trust and GROOTS have communicated publicly that they will be headed back to court if the elections outcome does not meet the constitutional threshold.
Output 1.2 – Strengthened institutional capacity and professionalism of Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC)
Robust tracking of preparedness towards 2017 General Elections: The SEPK project team continued to provide ongoing technical support to IEBC to establish and maintain a tracking system for the Elections Operation Plan (EOP) implementation. The system provides ready data which informs the Chairperson’s weekly media briefs on preparedness for 2017 General Elections. overall, implementation of the EOP is that it is on track, with political party primaries, dispute resolution by PPDT, Judiciary and IEBC, audit of the voter register, national pre-elections briefing, procurement of KIEMS, nomination of candidates, submission of party lists and procurement of ballot papers; publication of the register, testing simulation and certification of KIEMS and recruitment of temporary poll workers ongoing; and gazettement of polling stations and procurement of presidential ballot papers off track. The detailed status of implementation of the EOP is attached in Annex 1.
15 Article 81(b) prescribes one of the principles with which the electoral system in Kenya has to comply: Not more than two thirds of the members of elective bodies shall be of the same gender.
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Receipt, Storage and Retrieval of strategic electoral materials improved: Through a Warehousing and Logistics Expert, SEPK provided sustained technical support to the IEBC in disposal of obsolete items in the Principal Electoral Warehouse in Nairobi, and 17 regional warehouses available for receiving, storage and dispatch of various electoral material. The warehousing and logistics support is based on a number of frameworks including the comprehensive framework for disposal developed through the support of the project in the Fourth Quarter of 2016. A key achievement during this quarter is the effective logistics support which enabled Jubilee and Orange Democratic Movement parties to lease ballot boxes for their primaries. Preparations for the receipt, dispatch and transportation of strategic voting materials ahead of the polls were completed.
IEBC Strategic Communications improved: UNDP embedded a strategic communications consultant/advisor to IEBC. Through this support, a communications strategy has been completed and the advisor has supported the communications department of IEBC in strategic rolling out the same. The Commission has continued in this respect to have better structured engagement of the donor community and media owners on the work of the Commission. IEBC developed a digital (social) media strategy for 2017 General Elections and has trained its commissioners on media appearances/engagement. The Commission has also developed targeted messaging for various audiences including youth and university students. This support has been instrumental in development of a broader communication company engagement plan, to facilitate sustained communication and voter education during this period.
Through this intervention, there has been more systematized communication from the IEBC relating to electoral preparedness in the run up to the elections. IEBC’s ability to respond to crises through various media channels has also been relatively enhanced.
IEBC preparedness for 2017 General Elections: UNDP supported IEBC to undertake pre-election trainings for 434 male and 355 female field officials in seven clusters. The trainings involved exposing the officials to the KIEMs kits, sensitization on the voting process under the new electoral laws and the role of field officials in ensuring free, fair, credible and transparent voting, counting, collation and release of results. These trainings are expected to equip field staff with the skills they require to effectively coordinate the elections, and confidently so, under the oaths of office that all electoral officers have to take prior to the elections.
The trained staff were able to impart their knowledge on the use of the KIEMs kits to clerks who were recruited for the purpose of mass voter verification exercise that was conducted in May-June 2017. Approximately 11,000 KIEMs kits were deployed in different wards, prisons and diaspora voting centers to facilitate biometric verification of voters.
Output 1.3 – Strengthened institutional capacity and professionalism of Office of the Registrar of Political Parties (ORPP)
Nomination by political parties: The project supported Office of the Registrar of Political Parties to publish political party nomination rules and guidelines. These guidelines provided guidance to the 63 parties which participated in the primaries. The project in conjunction with stakeholders noted how the party primaries were conducted in view of assessing how application of the guidelines was developing. It was noted that the primaries were generally poorly organized and executed. Logistical difficulties were experienced leading to postponement of primaries by some parties. In some cases, there were accusations of rigging. There was also witnessed sporadic outbreaks of violence, intimidation, voter bribery and ballot stuffing. The Kenya National Commission on
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Human Rights16 points to trends in harassment of women aspirants to intimidate them. This indicates that political parties do not currently have the capacity or goodwill to foster internal democracy and conduct meaningful nominations, a gap that may require addressing in the medium term.
Some of the key challenges encountered in the realization of this outcome include:
1. Unwillingness by political parties to comply with electoral laws: as explained elsewhere, only 10% of the party lists submitted by political parties to the IEBC had complied with the law. This exposes parties to unwarranted litigation and thus needlessly consuming IEBC time and resources. Political parties also exhibited unwillingness to comply with the law on party primaries leading to the rather chaotic conduct of the same. More focus promoting adherence of parties to electoral law is required
2. Procurement obstacles: IEBC had sought to procure a firm for rendering strategic communications and advisory services. However, due to litigation over the procurement process17, the firm had not been contracted by the end of this quarter. This put considerable strain on the IEBC’s communications department and the strategic communications advisor owing to the increasing number and frequency of media crises that keep on emerging ahead of the elections
Project Outcome 2: Strengthened participation of voters, parties and candidates in the electoral process with emphasis on women, youth and disabled
CPD output targets
Project output targets Summary achievement in the first quarter
Status
Kenyan citizens and civil society meaningfully engage in democratic process and are empowered to be politically and socially engaged and to demand responsible and accountable governance from elected officials
Voter/civic education exercises undertaken through 5 channels (Maendeleo forum; NEC; newspapers; regional workshops; digital screens; video dens)
3 channels (Maendeleo policy forum; National Elections Conference and newspapers) used to undertake voter/civic education
Not achieved
5 million people reached by civic education initiatives
5,094,809 reached by civic education initiatives through TV
Achieved
200 media houses trained on gender responsive and conflict sensitive reporting
250 media houses including 60 TV stations and 150 radio stations sensitized using the guidelines for media coverage of elections. A total of 2,900 journalists have also been accredited by MCK using the guidelines.
Achieved
5 institutions adopt the MCK Guidelines for Coverage of Elections to train and guide their journalists
4 institutions including Nation Media Group, Royal Media Services, USAID and Danish Embassy adopt the guidelines to train 200, 90, 90 and 40 journalists respectively
Achieved
Achieved 17 initiatives for improving
women participation in the 16 CSOs and National Gender and Equality Commission supported to
Achieved
16 SEPK support contributes to election observation by the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights. 17 R v The Procurement Administrative Review Board & 2 others ex parte Transcend Media Group Ltd, JR No.468 of 2017
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electoral process promote women participation in electoral processes through the UN Women-led Women in Peace and Security (WPS) initiative
49% of total registered voters are women
47% of total registered voters are women
Partially Achieved
18% of candidates nominated for the 2017 General Elections are women
9.72% of the nominated candidates are women
Not achieved
28.05% and 26.95% of registered voters are male and female youth respectively
27.03% and 23.97% of registered voters are male and female youth respectively
Partially Achieved
0.75% of registered voters who are PWDs
0.88% of all registered voters are PWDs
Achieved
77.5% of PWDs registered as voters
14.96% of total number of PWDs are registered as voters
Achieved
15,000 voters reached through the revamped IEBC website
14,940 people reached through the website
Achieved
500,000 citizens engaged through social media platforms
631,981 citizens engaged through social media. This included 13,933 new
likes and 27,259 new followers on face book and twitter respectively
Achieved
Overall Status Achieved
Output 2.1 – More Informed Voters
A total of 5,094,809 people were reached through various voter education initiatives. UNDP supported IEBC to mobilize and educate members of the public on the electoral process through the Maendeleo Policy Forum (MPF), National Elections Conference and newspaper adverts.
The MPF is a dialogue forum of experts, the policy community and practitioners, which seeks to directly influence policy-making on democracy, governance and elections. The forum brought together 100 electoral experts and stakeholders to discuss Kenya’s preparedness and overall strategy to insulate the 2017 General Election against the threat of violent extremism and cybercrime. Participants to the forum identified early-warning indicators and undertake analysis of risk to Kenya’s stability before, during and after the 2017 election.
UNDP working with UN Women, Civil Society Organizations under Kura Yangu Sauti Yangu18 and other Electoral Technical Assistance Providers under the leadership of Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC), supported a National Elections Conference. The conference sought to (i) critically evaluate the state of preparedness among Kenya’s key electoral stakeholders to support and conduct the 2017 general elections; (ii) to synergize the efforts and of roles of stakeholders in ensuring credible and peaceful 2017 General Elections; and (iii) to rally Kenyans and key stakeholders to commit to credible and peaceful 2017 General Elections. The conference was attended by more than 1,500 members of the public. Among the key invited guests included H.E. the President Uhuru Kenyatta; Rt. Hon. Raila Odinga, the former Prime
18 Kura Yangu Sauti Yangu (Swahili for My Vote My Voice) is a coalition of like-minded civil society organizations, who have come together to proactively support Kenya’s preparations for the 2017 elections with a view to ensuring that the country minimizes the risks related to dysfunctional electoral competition which the country has experienced in the recent elections.
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Minister; H.E. Moussa Faki Mahamat, the Chairperson of the African Union; United States Ambassador to Kenya; the European Delegation Ambassador to Kenya, and the Director General of the United Nations Office at Nairobi (UNON). Key government and non-government institutions working on elections also show-cased their preparedness for the 2017 General Elections. The conference resolved, amongst other things, to: build public trust and confidence in the electoral process; update the public on the status of voters’ register audit by KPMG; ensure the Security and Integrity of electoral technology; advance Dispute Resolution Mechanisms in collaboration with key stakeholders, religious institutions, and Dispute Tribunals pre-election and Post-Election to ensure simple disputes do not result into violence. Detailed conference resolutions are availed in Annex 2 of this report.
The NEC gave opportunity to IEBC to apprise key stakeholders and the public on the level of electoral preparedness across all elements of the EoP. However, the statement by the former Prime Minister over allegations of impropriety by IEBC in relation to the procurement of the presidential ballot papers appeared to have deflected public attention from some of the main conference agenda. An assessment of the media coverage of the conference that ensued, reveals that more doubts rather than clarity over IEBC preparedness may have resulted.19 This notwithstanding, the NEC generated the desired public engagement and discourse over preparations towards the 2017 general elections and ultimately rallied stakeholders towards the August 8 elections based on sharing and conference conversations.
UN Women partners under an earlier issued call for proposals that selected (FIDA, Youth Agenda (which works with Youth Alive) and, CRAWN TRUST (which works with WEL, UDPK and AWCFS, and GVRC) saw progress in implementation of the objectives under SEPK towards initiatives that create awareness as to women’s leadership potential and also promote women’s involvement in promotion of peace and security.20 These partners therefore worked towards the following during this period;
Integrate gender in UWIANO Peace Platform and Elections Observation Group (ELOG)- through Federation of Women Lawyers (FIDA) and Youth Agenda through technical support;
Undertake advocacy interventions with key stakeholders towards enhancing women’s security in electioneering and promoting peaceful elections;
Capacity building of peace-platforms, women leaders and youth organization’s on UNSCR 1325, including negotiation and mediation skills;
Awareness/sensitization creation around peace and security and enhancing women’s security including popularizing the Women’s Charter through the 1000 Women’s March (in 5 counties), production of IEC material with interactive peace messaging;
Engage youth as active agents of peace through forums in select hotspots on election violence related interventions (Base Hangouts and Peace Torch); Engage media personalities on enhancing women’s security during the elections and conflict sensitive reporting- Editors, Journalists, Radio/ vernacular and influential Bloggers;
Use of social media as a platform for raising awareness on electoral gender-based violence;
Provision of legal assistance, advice, information and court support services (including
19 See for instance Gaitho M. “Ballot tender claims raise questions about electoral system’s credibility” in Daily Nation Wednesday June 14th edition, available online at http://www.nation.co.ke/oped/Opinion/scandal-begs-for-restoration-of-election-system-credibility/440808-3970968-1svvg0/index.html 20 The intervention was later recharacterized as the Women Peace and Security Programme
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chain of evidence custody) to EGBV survivors.
Through these initiatives, the Women, Peace and Security (WSP) programme reached directly 12,009 members of the public.
Output 2.2 – Increased participation of women in the electoral process
During the quarter, IEBC released the official voter registration statistics. 47% of the 19,611,423 registered voters are women. This shows a marginal decrease from the 49% in 2013. UN Women coordinated with civil society organizations (CSOs) to implement a Women in Peace and Security programme aimed at ensuring a peaceful electoral environment that supports women’s participation in elections. Despite this and other civil society initiatives that commenced in November 2016, the proportion of women candidates decreased from 11% in 2013 to 9.5% in 2017. Despite this marginal decrease, the number of women candidates was remarkably high at 1,358. Distributed among various positions as follows: President = 0; Governor = 9; Senator = 20; Member of National Assembly = 131; Member of County Assembly = 900. It is expected that given these statistics, there could be, for the first time, women elected to serve as Governors and Senators.
UN Women supported implementation of the Nomination Strategy for Gender Equality in which political parties committed to having women comprise at least one-third of their candidates during the primaries to contest for political office. This was a positive non-legislated measure that political parties devoted to adhere to, so as to move the country towards the realization of the not more than two-thirds gender principle in political leadership. However, SEPK monitoring of the primaries (through UN Women partner CMD) revealed that no political party realized this pledge. Various reasons were given by political parties for failure to meet this commitment: fewer women presented themselves for competition during political party primaries; women
constraints and limitations as compared to their male competitors; candidates faced dire financial violence and intimidation against women candidates; and low awareness of small fringe political parties, their ideologies and brands. The participation of women in the primaries and their being nominated to run for the 2017 General Elections points to the following plausible conclusions:
i) There is a high likelihood of having more than one female elected as Governor and Senator during the 2017 General Elections.
ii) It is unlikely there will be a major change with regard to women elected as MNAs. In 2013, only 16 women were elected as MNAs. The figure could drop if the 12% success rate is anything to go by. Positively however, there is likely to be an increase in the number of women elected to the seat through major parties such as ODM. During the 2013 General Elections, Jubilee Party collectively had 8 MNAs; although some of the women lost during the party primaries in 2017, there was equally a new number of high potential newcomers who are likely to retain the numbers high. ODM had only one (1) MNA who was a woman. The party has since nominated 3 women in its strongholds, meaning the number could increase in 2017.
iii) There is a high likelihood that the number of women (82) who were elected as MCAs in 2017 will remain the same as the number in 2013. A nominal increase is possible but may not double in line with the numbers that presented themselves for the seat.
The success rate for women candidates is likely to be influenced by one or a combination of the following factors: (i) financial constraints to cater for among others campaign expenses, membership and nomination fees and also dispute resolution costs; (ii) perceived opportunity cost of leaving gainful employment to run for elective offices; (iii) the effect of negotiated democracy – particularly in Northern Kenya Counties which largely worked against women
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candidates. In the North-Eastern region, particularly in Mandera, Wajir and Garissa, elders from various clans played a significant role in selecting candidates for important elective seats, leaving mainly MCA positions for aspiring candidates to contest in the party primaries; (iv) internal Party Politics and the patriarchal nature of the parties’ culture which usually works to the disadvantage of women candidates; and (iv) women aspirants and their supporters subjected to Violence Against Women in Elections, including threats of and actual violence, harassment and abusive messages on social media. Through UN Women, SEPK support to civil society partner CMD led to an analysis of the party primaries. CMD’s report, Tracking of the Gender Responsiveness of the April 2017 Political Party Primaries indicates that although parties committed to nominate at least 30% of women candidates during the primaries, no party met this promise. There was no proper strategy that political parties could use to realize this without being perceived to have subverted such a democratic process. Also, there were largely fewer women who presented themselves for nomination during the primaries compared to men. Of importance to note is that none of the top 5 performing parties attracted more than 15% of women candidates. Output 2.3 – Increased participation of youth, PWDs and other marginalized groups:
Civil Society Partners supported under the project, reached to targeted demographics and engaged them through community conversations, radio talk shows and outreach activities to seek support for women’s leadership. ACORD engaged 436 community members across 6 constituencies in public debates to influence attitudes towards women’s leadership. Through Youth Agenda, ALDEF, ACORD and FIDA Kenya among others, women candidates were supported through provision of IEC material to help in profiling and increasing their visibility. ACORD convened conversations with 60 village elders while CIFA reached out to 59 community elders from Wajir and its environs to sensitize them on the place of women in leadership and to rally their support for women leaders. In Kirinyaga, partner CRAWN Trust reached 2400 people directly to form political capital and support the women’s agenda. Partners in Wajir, Marsabit and Turkana organized community outreach activities and sensitized community members on the value of women’s leadership.
Owing to voter education efforts by SEPK and other actors, the proportion of youth registered as voters increased from 46% in 2013 to 51% in 2017. The proportion of registered voters who are PWDs also increased from 0.75% to 0.88%. This increase may be attributed to targeted media and voter education campaigns supported by the project during Mass Voter Registration (MVR) exercises in 2016 and 2017. The total number of PWDs registered as voters is still low compared to the national registration details. While 77.5% of the total eligible population is registered as voters, only 14.96% of the total eligible PWDs are registered as voters, this points to a combination of systemic issues which hinder participation of PWDs in electoral processes. The situation may also be that there are many PWDs who have not declared their PWD status in their registration details hence they are not captured in the voter register as PWDs.
Output 2.4 – More objective, balanced and gender sensitive reporting on electoral issues and processes
2,900 Journalists accredited using the Elections Coverage Guidelines: The Elections Coverage Guidelines revised and published by the Media Council of Kenya (MCK) with technical and financial support from SEPK were used to enhance the capacity of 250 media editors, sub-editors, station managers, bureau chiefs, parliamentary and political reporters and journalists from all the 47 counties of Kenya. Sixty TV stations, 150 radio stations and 2,900 journalists have been accredited based on the guidelines. The National Media Group, Royal Media Services, United
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States Agency for International Development and the Danish Embassy in Kenya adapted the guidelines for training of 200, 90, 90 and 40 journalists respectively. The guidelines, targeted advocacy and sensitization of media houses, and training of journalists, have renewed the commitment and increased the interest of mainstream media in balanced, gender responsive and conflict sensitive coverage of and reporting on elections.
Public engagement through social media: During the quarter, 631,981 people were reached through social media and IEBC website. This is more than double the 283,900 reached in the first quarter. This can be attributed to the revamped IEBC website, which is more interactive and user-friendly. The embedding of two social media experts at IEBC is the other reason why IEBC social media presence has exponentially increased, with 13,933 new likes and 27,259 new followers in Facebook and Twitter respectively. As per the comments, the dominant issue was that of payment of clerks who worked extra 5 days during MVR2 due to a court ruling. The tweet was timely as Political Party Primaries were in full swing and facing immense challenges. This might have been the tweet that gave rise to the number of prominent independent candidates. The nominations exercise was a great time to remind the public that IEBC is an arbiter and not a competitor. The presidential nominations exercise went well with people having increased interest in the process and requirements to be nominated. The public was overjoyed to see the return of the voter registration checking mechanisms including the new web portal and short message service (SMS) short code. However, there were quite a bit of friction with issues pertaining to data entry errors in the register. For example, ID number sequences, which do not exist having voters attached to them. IEBC has addressed this concern through the KPMG report and the public seems content to trust in the KIEMS biometric device as a deterrent to voter fraud. As always, jobs application continued to be the highest interest topic in IEBC social media sites. This underscores the correlation between IEBC’s audience and youth unemployment.
Some of the key challenges that may have affected progress towards realization of this outcome include:
1. Delays in a coordinated rolling-out of massive voter education campaigns: legal obstacles in the procurement of a media agency to provide a coordinated voter education campaigns have delayed the much-needed public awareness and sensitization activities of IEBC. Due to this uncertainty, IEBC was hesitant to submit requests for procurement of voter education activities to SEPK. Secondly, even though the Kenya Elections Assistance Programme (KEAP) resumed in the 1st quarter of 2017, the earlier suspension of funding to CSOs had hampered the sustained provision of voter education in many parts of the country. Thirdly, the key voter education providers under the auspices of the Elections Technical Assistance Providers (KETAP)21 have not had a coordination meetings to harmonize and synergize their actions. For these reasons, it is argued that sensitization of voters has not taken place as envisaged22.
2. Congested activity schedules: SEPK had intended to support a voter education drive targeting the mass voter verification exercise. However, numerous requests from IEBC on other critical activities (training of election officials, ESAP, support for PPDT etc) appeared to have crowded-out the procurement of the necessary activities for
21 KETAP is convened is IEBC and includes UNDP-SEPK, IFES, URAIA, Act among other agencies providing technical support to IEBC. 22 See AFRICOG & KPTJ, “Ready or not? An assessment of Kenya’s preparedness for the 8th August 2017 general election” May 2017 available at https://africog.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Ready-Or-Not_An-Assessment-of-Kenya%E2%80%99s-Preparedness-for-General-Elections-on-8-August-2017.pdf last accessed on 15th August 2017
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supporting voter education. 3. Lack of buy-in for the Women Situation Room intervention: Under the UNWomen
support to CSOs, the project had intended to establish a situation room as a coordination mechanisms for mobilizing support and response mechanism for women candidates during the election period. However, the initiative encountered headwinds following failure to garner the necessary buy-in from the GoK. As a result, the initiative was reprogrammed and recharacterized as the Women Peace and Security Project. Owing to this some delays were encountered in rolling out the activities envisaged.
Project Outcome 3: Election security and risk management strengthened with specific focus on women, youth, PWDs and other special interest groups
CPD output targets Project output targets Summary achievement in the first quarter
Status
Kenyan citizens and civil society meaningfully engage in democratic process and are empowered to be politically and socially engaged and to demand responsible and accountable governance from elected officials
19,850,837 (10,134,161 male and 9,716,676 female) registered voters
19,611,423 (8,698,160 male and 7,713,463 female) voters registered
Partially achieved
Implementation of EOP tracked EOP tracking tool used to identify progress of implementation of EOP activities.
Achieved
597 officials engaged in Electoral Operations Planning
870 officials engaged in pre-election planning seminar
Achieved
80 staff trained in electoral risk identification and electoral climate/ political analysis
43 male and 37 female regional staff trained to be risk champions and to develop risk profiles for each of the regions
Achieved
1,000 copies each of ESAP materials finalized, printed and disseminated
1,000 copies each of training manual on electoral security, security guide role card and handbook on elections security printed and launched
Achieved
2,000 officers trained on ESAP 1,730 including 60 Master trainers and 1,670 regional ToTs developed.
Partially achieved.
3 peace platforms, CSOs and grassroots organizations capacity built
3 platforms fostered with Uwiano, ELOG and KNCHR to monitor and report on election, peace and security before, during and after the 2017 GE
Achieved
6,000 domestic observers deployed to monitor the 2017 GE
290 LTOs deployed to 290 Constituency and 94 Special Interest Group Observers recruited and deployed; recruitment of
Ongoing
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7,500 General Elections Observers underway
80 human rights monitors deployed to observe and report on human rights violations
84 human rights monitors recruited, trained and deployed in 24 counties to observe respect for human rights during and after the political party primaries
Achieved
Overall Status Achieved
Output 3.2 – Strengthened electoral operations and logistics
Strengthened Elections Operations Planning: UNDP supported IEBC to convene more than 870 officers from headquarters and field offices to undertake an operational planning exercise for the 2017 General Elections. During the exercise, the team reviewed the voting process, progress in the acquisition of key equipment and supplies, progress in the procurement, deployment and testing of KIEMS, and the recruitment of temporary staff to support elections. The field staff identified the major challenges which may undermine the successful management and coordination of the 2017 General Elections and this will be applied in contingency and risk planning.
As explained elsewhere in this report, the target officers cascaded this training to the over 10,000 clerks who were involved in the Biometric Verification of Voters exercise done in May-June 2017. The exercise was concluded smoothly in over 10,000 polling centers, 138 prisons and 12 diaspora centers in Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi and South Africa.23 A total of 6,893,861 (or 35% 0f registered) voters were verified using the KIEMS kits.24 This process continued along with the audit of the voters register by the KPMG, which concluded after release of the report on the same on 9th June 2017. These activities paved way for the certification of the Register of Voters on June 27th 2017, vide Kenya Gazette Vol 84 dated 27th June 2017.
Output 3.3 – Election security and risk management with specific focus on women, youth, PWDs and other special interest groups
Enhanced capacity of IEBC to anticipate and manage electoral risks: SEPK has been supporting IEBC to put in place a robust risk identification and management framework. The framework was completed and used to train 43 male and 37 female field staff in electoral risk mapping and development of risk profiles. The trainers have developed regional risk profiles for IEBC. This is expected to enhanced the Commission’s capacity to anticipate, manage and plan around electoral risks.
However, the sensitization of the Commissioners on the risk framework was deferred due to congested work schedules of the commission. It would have been desirable to have this activity early in the year but the delays in recruitment and onboarding of Commissioners made this virtually impossible. Senior officers who took part in the development of the framework are however expected to regularly apprise Commissioners on the risk profiles and mitigation strategies as part of their routine briefings.
23 See UNDP, “Strengthening electoral processes in Kenya: Kenya elections update” No.20 Week 14-20 May 2017 24 See IEBC Press Statement released on 6th June 2017 and available at https://www.iebc.or.ke/uploads/resources/E9aCwKB0rO.pdf
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Strengthened Electoral Security Arrangement Programme: UNDP supported IEBC to develop, print and launch Electoral Security Arrangement Programme (ESAP)25 materials26. 1000 copies each of the training manual on electoral security, security guide role card and handbook on electoral security were produced and launched. The materials were used to train 60 national master trainers and 383 county trainers on ESAP. The master trainers and county trainers will be used to train a further 1600 constituency trainers who will ultimately train the 150,000 to 180,000 security officials to be deployed on election day. The security agencies will be drawn from the Kenya Police Service, Administration Police Service, National Youth Service, Kenya forest Service, Kenya Wildlife Service and Kenya Prison Service.
Further, SEPK support led to development of an EGBV training curriculum and manual to be used by duty bearers (National Police Service, Ministry of Health, Government Chemist, Chief Government Pathologist, Government health facilities, Office of Director of Prosecutions and Judiciary) to ensure EGBV survivors access timely help. The manual was simplified into a pocket friendly material- and all the 150,000 to 180,000 security officers who will be deployed to secure elections will access the material as this will be disseminated through the Election Security Assistance Programme (ESAP). The EGBV manual is designed to assist in county level (5) cluster trainings for EGBV response teams- to strengthen County and Community Gender Based Violence (GBV) Networks on prevention, rapid response and referral mechanisms (Medical & Psychosocial Support) for EGBV electoral gender based violence.
Enhanced Observation and Monitoring of Electoral Process: SEPK sought to promote stakeholder engagement in monitoring of electoral process through support for the Elections Long-term Observation Group (ELOG) 27 and the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights (KNCHR). Through SEPK support, ELOG strengthened its programme management capacity by recruiting 2 officers to its secretariat. With the additional capacity, ELGO was able to release 7 periodic reports, hold 4 media briefings and launch a newsletter- Darubini ya Uchaguzi. ELOG deployed 290 Long Term Election Observers to all constituencies whereas 94 Special Interest Group Observes (SIGOs) were recruited and deployed within the Quarter. The SIGOs monitored the elections dispute resolution processes as conducted by the PPDT and IEBC’s Dispute Resolution Committee. They also attended public rallies in various parts of the country, where they noted an increase in incidences of violence targeting special interest groups. They also noted limited targeting of SIGs by voter educators as well. Through these interventions, ELOG continues to provide a credible source of information for assessing electoral environment ahead of the elections. ELOG also continues to engage duty bearers over issues that arise from observation processes.
In this period, ELOG faced some controversy when it was reported in the media that a senior official from one of its member-organizations (SUPEKM) had endorsed the President Uhuru Kenyatta. The matter was discussed within the decision-making organs of ELOG and thereafter, SUPKEM issued a public statement, distancing itself from the media reports. This incident put to
25 See statement by the NPS during the ESAP launch on 8 May 2017- Available at: http://www.nationalpolice.go.ke/2015-09-08-17-56-33/news/209-election-security-arrangement-project-esap.html 26 See statement by IEBC during the ESAP launch on 8 May 2017- Available at: https://www.iebc.or.ke/uploads/resources/qD8IiVAHqr.pdf 27 ELOG is a long-term, permanent and national forum or network which comprises of CSOs, including FBOs, with the mandate of strengthening democracy in Kenya and the African Region through promoting transparent and accountable electoral processes that include public participation. ELOG undertakes impartial, integral and inclusive observation and monitoring of electoral process. Its findings are captured in objective and independent reports which are used to inform strengthening of electoral processes.
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test, the level of adherence of ELOG’s code of conduct by its members. Having received funding from various entities, ELOG also had the challenge of harmonizing its budget and ensuring all its activities were sufficiently funded. For this reason, ELOG sought to reallocate $90,000 from the SEPK’s contribution towards rationalization of its budget. In the next period, ELOG will embark on recruitment of 7500 General Elections Observers.
The SEPK project (OHCHR and UNDP) supported Kenya National Commission on Human Rights (KNCHR)28 to deploy 84 monitors in 29 counties29 to monitor respect of the right to vote and the right to be voted in during political party primaries and the electioneering period. KNCHR observed the political party primaries and released a report- The Fallacious Vote- in May 2017. The report documented 377 electoral offences and a host of malpractices that were committed during the primaries. Further, an online election management system was developed and the same incorporated the tools in an all-inclusive portal that could receive data in real time from all the monitors spread across the country, synthesize and generate statistics, trends and patterns. This system was instrumental in the timely documentation and development of advisories. These findings have been escalated to relevant agencies including the Ministry of Interior and Coordination of National Government, IEBC, ODPP and OAG for various actions subject to the mandate of the agency in question. During the next quarter, the project will monitor the action taken by these agencies and the extent to which such action has served to increase compliance with the electoral legal framework.
Through this project, the KNCHR established an SMS platform 22359 and free hotline 0800 720 627. The two were widely publicized to the members of the public through social media, KNCHR website, TV, newspapers, community radios and public forums thereby enabling members of the
28 The Kenya National Commission on Human Rights (KNCHR) is an independent National Human Rights Institution created by Article 59 if the Constitution of Kenya 2010 and established through the KNCHR Act of Parliament (the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights Act, 2011. It is the state’s lead agency in the promotion and protection of human rights. The main goal of KNCHR is to investigate and provide redress for human rights violations, to research and monitor the compliance of human rights norms and standards, to conduct human rights education, to facilitate training, campaigns and advocacy on human rights as well as collaborate with other stakeholders in Kenya. 29 Bungoma, Kisii, Migori, Siaya, Tana River, Lamu, Kwale, Garissa, Marsabit, Turkana, Mandera, Isiolo, Samburu, Baringo, Nakuru,Kirinyaga Meru, Laikipia, Elgeyo Marakwet, Uasin Gishu, Nandi, Kericho, Bomet, Narok, Nairobi, Kiambu, Murang’a and, Kisumu
Figure 2: KNCHR analysis of recorded incidents from the monitoring exercise of the Nomination process
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public to easily reach out to the KNCHR. Approximately 3,000 SMS were received between April and June and an average of 3 complaints received per day through the hotline in the period under review. The commission was also able to give legal advice to 26 aspirants among them 5 women aspirants after the launch of the party primaries report.
Overall Challenges
Notable challenges encountered within the reporting period that could affect the progress towards realization of this outcome include:
1. Litigation risks that could impact on electoral operations: Delays resolution of cases against IEBC over audit of register had impact on finalization of the verification process. Similarly, litigation over the ballot papers tender may affect electoral operations in the next quarter. In turn, these will put on hold requests from IEBC to SEPK over preparations towards support for electoral operations.
2. Conflicting schedules causing delays in roll-out of key activities: The County and Constituency Trainer of Trainers workshops were to be held in June 2017. However, due to the convening of the National Elections Conference, the project lost 2 weeks and hence all the envisaged ESAP training workshops could not be held on time. The hectic schedules of IEBC Commissioners resulted in the deferment of dissemination of the risk framework to the Commission.
Project Outcome 4: Strengthened electoral justice and increased compliance with the electoral legal framework
CPD output targets Project output targets Summary achievement in the first quarter
Status
Kenyan citizens and civil society meaningfully engage in democratic process and are empowered to be politically and socially engaged and to demand responsible and accountable governance from elected officials
2 EDR mechanisms capacity built
PPDT supported to develop political parties IDR model rules and PPDT frequently asked questions (1,000 copies each printed disseminated).
Achieved
67 political parties adapt the IDR model rules
63 political parties applied IDR model rules in the resolution of disputes from their primaries
Partially achieved
100% of cases handled by the IEBC tribunal
30 out of 30 cases presented to IEBC resolved
Achieved
50% of electoral disputes from PP primaries escalated from PPDT to the High Court
76% of the 501 cases handled by PPDT escalated to the High Court.
Achieved
3 stakeholders engaged in EDR process
5 stakeholders – Media; LSK; JTI; ODPP; PPDT; IEBC, NPS; AG engaged in the EDR process
Achieved
8 electoral malpractices and offenses reported during party primaries
377 electoral malpractices reported during party primaries: 116=missing names; 81=lack of security, late opening; 34=insufficient materials; 17=violence including EGBV; 12=bribery, harassment; 2=misuse of public resources;
Achieved
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1=intimidation
8 electoral malpractices and offences reported during campaigns
592 malpractices reported during campaigns: 49=violence including EGBV; 51=misuse of public resources; 33=incitement; 29=bribery; 136=lack of security; 8=unequal access; 48=inaccessibility of venues; 25=use of children; 4=media harassment; 9=displacement of people; 30 = violation of the code of conduct; 82=verification;
Achieved
Overall Status Achieved
Output 4.1 – Increased capacity for just and timely electoral dispute resolution that protects all and especially women
Electoral dispute resolution mechanisms strengthened: The project supported PPDT in its outreach activities, specifically with the media and with the Law Society of Kenya. These stakeholder initiatives sought to enhance knowledge of the mandate of the PPDT among stakeholders. PPDT stakeholder engagements with the Law Society of Kenya further outlined matters of gender sensitivity in party dispute resolution. The project support to the Media Council of Kenya sought to enhance knowledge of electoral laws and jurisprudence among media actors. The project supported capacity building of members of the Nairobi Branch of the Law Society of Kenya so as to enhance knowledge of new electoral laws and procedures. The above interventions contributed to enhanced capacity of PPDT in handling electoral disputes within its mandate. A total of 501 cases arising out of political party primaries were presented to the PPDT. As per the PPDT’s summary report of June 22, 2017, 40 disputes were filed by female aspirants out of the 305 presented to the Political Parties Dispute Tribunal (PPDT). Disputes submitted by female aspirants were the same as those of men and were heard and determined on their own merit as per evidence tendered and justifications made without bias. All cases filed in court after nominations affecting female candidates have been cleared and allow the female aspirants to participate in the elections including prominent ones such as that of Hon. Wavinya Ndeti a female gubernatorial candidate for Machakos County. A total of 105 appeals were filed to the High Court on appeal from the PPDT and these affected both men and women. 19 cases were subsequently filed to the Court of Appeal affecting both men and women. It can be observed that women who sort for redress received positive and timely response. The redress institutions especially PPDT and Judiciary somewhat demonstrated independence, firmness and responded in a timely manner. An analysis of these rulings pointed towards the need to strengthen the capacity of PPDT, need to build knowledge of the PPDT and its mandate among political parties and the need to foster collaboration between political parties and PPDT. Within the reporting period, IEBC Dispute Resolution Committee received a total of 372 disputes arising from the nomination of candidates for various seats. These disputes were heard and disposed of ahead of the 20th June 2017 deadline. SEPK contributed to this process through the deployment of 2 UNVs who rendered research assistance support to the Committee.
Output 4.2 – strengthened enforcement of electoral laws and regulations
Model Rules on intra-party dispute resolution disseminated: UNDP-SEPK supported the Political Parties Dispute Tribunal (PPDT) to publish 2000 copies of the political parties internal dispute resolution (IDR) model rules and frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) on PPDT. These materials
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were used to sensitize political parties on dispute resolution mechanisms and institutional framework. The FAQ’s were disseminated to among others, female litigants who sought to understand the mandate of the PPDR following disputes arising from party primaries. The model rules were adapted and applied by 63 political parties in dealing with disputes arising out of their primaries.
Capacity of judicial officials in adjudication of electoral cases enhanced through the International Women Judges Colloquium in collaboration with KWJA and the Kenya Magistrates Annual Colloquium: Within the Quarter, SEPK sought to enhance the capacity of judicial officials in upholding electoral laws in the course of adjudication of electoral cases brought to the courts in the current electoral cycle. Special focus was placed on EGBV as a possible ground for nullification of elections within a petition. Towards this end, SEPK made a financial contribution towards the preparations for International Women Judges Colloquium held on 16-20th May 2017 in Nairobi. This contribution catered for production of conference materials and publication of a compendium of papers presented at the conference. The President of Kenya graced the occasion and lend his personal support for enactment of the 2/3rd gender rule legislation and the HeforShe Campaign. The SEPK”s Gender Advisor made a presentation on EGBV as a possible ground for nullification of elections while the UN Women Country Director made a presentation on mobilizing positive masculinity for women’s empowerment. The meeting received positive coverage in local media.
In collaboration with the Judiciary Training Institute, SEPK also supported the convening of the Annual Magistrates Colloquium held in Nairobi in June 2017. SEPK contributed to the costs of resource persons who made presentations at the said Colloquium. Their presentations focused on the new electoral laws and procedures in adjudication of electoral petitions. Through this intervention, the capacity of magistrates in handling petitions arising from election of Members of County Assemblies (MCAs) was enhanced.
Overall Challenges:
The following challenges were encountered in the quarter:
1. Delays in signing of the Letter of Agreement between UNDP and the Judiciary: To facilitate flexible and efficient support to the judiciary and its institutions30, UNDP sought to sign a Letter of Agreement (LOA) with the Judiciary. Such an agreement would have facilitated an effective administration of components of work with the Judiciary institutions within this period. While the signature of this administrative instrument is still being pursued, activities were shifted to the subsequent quarter, that pertained to planned interventions with the Judiciary Committee on Elections.
2. Mismatched demand for electoral justice with available capacity at PPDT: As the filing of disputes with PPDT increased, it became apparent that capacity for the PPDT members to hear and determine the high number of cases was limited given the short time frame. The SEPK unfortunately could not re-programme resources for additional support to the PPDT, given the limitation of time. In future, the growing quest for electoral justice at the PPDT should be properly anticipated and necessary support (provision of short-term research assistance services) factored into the project.
30 This includes the Judiciary Committee on Elections (JCE), Judiciary Training Institute (JTI) and the Political Parties Dispute Tribunal (PPDT).
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Project Outcome 5: Effective and functioning SEPK Project Management Unit (PMU) established
CPD output targets Project output targets
Summary achievement in the first quarter
Status
Kenyan citizens and civil society meaningfully engage in democratic process and are empowered to be politically and socially engaged and to demand responsible and accountable governance from elected officials
Key project meetings organized and facilitated
1 Project Steering Committee (PSC) meeting; 3 Elections Donor Group (EDG) meetings 1 Project Donor Group (PDG) meeting
Ongoing
Coordination between various ETAPs strengthened
SEPK participated in coordination meeting with USAID-funded Kenya Electoral Assistance Programme (KEAP) and IEBC
Ongoing
Overall Status Ongoing
Project Management and Oversight: There were some changes in the project management arrangement following the departure of the former Programme Manager. UNDP redeployed internal capacity from the country office to address this gap an provide effective project management and the intensive capacity development demands under the project. The project also benefitted from deployment of programme management capacity from UNDP Tanzania and integrated electoral procurement capacity from UNDP- Ethiopia. All these contributed greatly to the effectiveness of the PMU in being able to work under pressure against tight deadlines and manage the increased scale and scope of activities due to the looming elections.
Donor Coordination: During the quarter, the project organized and participated in one (1) Project Steering Committee (PSC) meeting; three (3) Elections Donor Group (EDG) meetings, and one (1) Project Donor Group (PDG) meetings. These activities contributed to efficient management of SEPK, improved coordination with project stakeholders, reduced duplication of initiatives implemented through ETAPs, and enhanced much need information exchange between key actors in elections.
To improve project management and coordination, the SEPK project participated in various coordination meetings with the IEBC and the USAID funded KEAP project. These engagements have improved project management, coordination of multiple initiatives by the two entities, efficiency in resource use as well as regular reflection on the changing electoral environment, and, opportunities for programmatic adjustments. However, there is still need for a much broader engagement of other technical service providers under the Election Technical Assistance Providers (ETAP) framework (which includes other actors beyond IEBC, UNDP & KEAP). It is envisaged that closer collaboration of ETAP actors will increase in the next quarter.
M&E, knowledge management, communications and reporting: SEPK continued producing and disseminating to key stakeholders, weekly elections briefings as well as monthly updates. These reports tracked the key electoral process and kept stakeholders apprised of the unfolding developments. SEPK also produced the 2016 Annual Report which documented the achievements and lessons learnt in the previous year as well as the Q1 progress report (2017) to track progress in the first period of the year. To enhance the project’s M&E capacity, SEPK commissioned a baseline survey in Quarter 1. A report of the survey was produced and validated in Quarter 2 before an impending dissemination.
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Overall Challenges
Some of the key challenges encountered include:
1. Limited visibility of SEPK: Even though SEPK has a well-documented communications strategy, the project is not well known among stakeholders.31 The project will institute engagements in the subsequent period that increase visibility. Towards this endeavor, SEPK will safeguard the independence and leadership role of IEBC while avoiding any perception of interference that might be inadvertently created.
31 Feedback from lawyers attending sensitization meetings convened by the PPDT
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2. Targeting, Sustainability of Results, Strengthening National Capacities and South-South
and Triangular Cooperation
No south-south triangular cooperation initiatives undertaken during the quarter.
3. Partnerships
In the implementation of the SEPK project, UNDP and UN Women worked in collaboration with OHCHR and other UN agencies whose mandates are relevant to electoral reform in Kenya. This strengthened the principle of Delivering as One (DaO). Similarly, the project worked closely with various interventions under the auspices of the UWIANO Platform for Peace, most of which aimed at promoting peace building through early warning and conflict transformation.
UN Women continued to partner with both state and non-state actors. The partnerships were mainly for purposes of influencing policy, coordination, providing platforms for dialogue between state and non-state actors, implementing the SEPK activities, sharing knowledge with observer missions on elections, and for providing leadership on gender issues. The table below summarizes the key partnerships and the purpose.
Partner Purpose
IEBC The project engaged with IEBC mainly in the planning of the National elections conference to ensure a theme of inclusion of women and marginalised groups was discussed. UN Women chaired the discussions of the side event on inclusion. A report of the meeting was generated, and the main conference communique included a message on inclusion.
Ministry of Public Service Youth and Gender Affairs (State Department of Gender-SDGA)
UN Women engaged with SDGA to bring together over 150 women candidates for various positions to dialogue with SDGA, Ministry of Interior (Late CS Nkaissery) and IEBC chair on the mechanisms that are available to ensure women have a level playing field. The Interior CS for example assured the women of security provision, and an avenue for quick response to security threats through the candidates reporting to SDGA or IEBC. IEBC promised to hold political parties accountable on ensuring party lists met the minimum 30% inclusion requirement.
Judiciary The project partnered with the Kenya Women Judges Association (KWJA) in deliberating access to justice by women candidates in elections.
EU and COMESA election observers
UN Women engaged EU election observers and provided updates and data on the performance of women in registration, party primaries, security for women, and access to justice mechanisms.
African Union election observers
UN Women engaged African Union election observers and provided updates and data on the performance of women in registration, party primaries, security for women, and access to justice mechanisms. UN Women suggested ensuring inclusion of women leaders in various mechanisms including eminent persons for any mediation.
Coordination platform with other election providers-
The project continued the coordination platform with other election support providers focussing on women inclusion-especially Uraia Trust and National Democratic Institution (NDI). This purposed to ensure
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Partner Purpose
Uraia Trust and NDI continued country mapping, synergies in supporting women candidates, and providing voter education reports.
Election Donor Group (EDG)
The project continued to attend the EDG meetings and provided briefs on voter education, and women participation in elections especially on voter register and in party primaries.
Gender Donor Group (GDG)
The project continued to attend the GDG meetings and provided briefs on women participation in elections especially on voter register and in party primaries.
Implementing partners
UN Women continued its support to 15 civil society partners implementing inclusion of women in elections. UN Women undertook a midterm review the progress and refocused all partner support to the “90-day strategy” where all partners would focus on supporting women candidates who made it through party nominations for positions of governor, senator, and MP, on political parties.
UN agencies A joint UN midterm review meeting of SEPK was undertaken and the annual work plan 2017 was reprioritized to improve value for money, analysis of the electoral environment was undertaken under leadership of OHCHR, and a briefing to the UNON Director General on gender issues was undertaken.
4. Strengthening National Capacities
Results achieved Institution National capacity strengthened
1) Increased public
confidence in IEBC to
coordinate and manage
2017 General Elections
IEBC Management and coordination of elections
Stakeholder engagement Electoral dispute resolution Voter education
2) Improved information
sharing and coordination
between political parties
ORPP Regulation and coordination of political parties
3) Enhanced capacity of the
judiciary for timely and
expeditious EDR
PPDT Technical and financial support in stakeholder engagement and development of knowledge products
JTI Capacity building of magistrates and selected lawyers in Electoral dispute resolution;
4) Enhanced electoral
security
National Police; Establishment of Pool of Trainers of Trainers to cascade down ESAP content to 150,000 to 180,000 security officers involved in elections;
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5. Monitoring and Evaluation
M&E activity Key outcomes/ observation Recommendation Action taken
Monitoring visit of journalists training in Kisumu using the MCK guidelines
1. Journalists are often under
a pressure from media
houses to develop
sensational stories which
will sell. Since it is an
employment relationship
most journalists are
basically “hostages” to
their salaries.
2. Women are often depicted
in news as victims of
violence,
unknowledgeable, or “joy-
riders” on a man’s success
or coattails. This can be
changed by focusing more
on achievements of
women, particularly
aspirants as opposed to
pushing their stereotype
feminine features.
3. IEBC promised to
communicate regularly and
openly with all journalists
to ensure they have
verifiable information. It
was discovered that
regional journalists do not
benefit from the direct
relationship with the
Commission that their
Nairobi counterparts do.
1. Information Dissemination: IEBC to maintain a closer relationship with field journalists from all regions.
2. Verification: In the era of digital communication and immediacy, journalists should be empowered to spend more time verifying stories rather than rush to break the news. In addition, they agreed to maintain a neutral net presence on their own personal accounts if people identify them with the media house online i.e. Not use their own popularity for political messaging.
3. Ethics: Even though the stakes are high and competition is stiff, journalists are to maintain their ethical standards in reporting.
4. MCK Action: MCK to monitor and take action against journalists within the MCK who are breaching the rules of reporting as per the guidelines to support either side.
5. Media Monitoring: SEPK to support MCK to monitor and report on the extent to which media houses and journalists comply with the
Lessons incorporated in subsequent trainings and accreditation of journalists
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4. Journalists expressed
concern over bribery for
stories. And some admitted
to having benefited from
such relations in the past.
5. Social Media is becoming a
go-to source for stories,
however, the speed of
breaking news online
supersedes the speed of
verifying the news.
Guidelines for Coverage and Reporting of Elections.
Survey 1. Finalization of SEPK
baseline survey
2. Review of initial and fair
draft reports
1. Need to validate report with
key stakeholders
Report submitted to management for review and approval before being subjected to external stakeholders
6. Knowledge Management
During the reporting period, the following knowledge products were developed through the support of UNDP and UN Women under SEPK:
Title, author, date Link Evidence Electoral security Police Role Card
The Police Role card summarizes election offenses so as to aid in their prevention, detection and prosecution. It also contains practical information on the interaction between security agencies and election officials in the electoral process.
Handbook on elections security
The handbook provides security agencies, IEBC and other stakeholders with the comprehensive guide to electoral security before, during and after elections.
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Training manual on electoral security
This manual aims to develop the capacity of IEBC and security enforcement agencies for improved provision of security before, during and after elections.
Electoral Gender Based Violence (EGBV) Pocket Size Information Booklet
The booklet provides guidance to all, especially security a=officers on definition, causes, examples and monitoring of EGBV; what one can do in case of EGBV; role of various stakeholders and mandate holders in curbing and dealing with EGBV; and useful contacts in cases where one witnesses EGBV.
Under the framework of the collaboration with the KNCHR, the following material were developed as part of the implementation of the activity
Title, author, date Link Evidence Preliminary findings on the political primaries Raising the Red Flag: KNCHR, 20 April 2017
http://www.knchr.org/Newsroom/ PressStatements.aspx
This media brief was a documentation of the preliminary observations in the 2017 nomination process where the KNCHR raised the red flag on cases of violence and immediately called on the ODPP and police to initiate arrests, investigations and prosecutions. This preliminary brief also put all actors to notice that the KNCHR has deployed human rights monitors across the country.
The Fallacious Vote: A Human Rights Account of the 2017 political party primaries KNCHR, May 15, 2017
http://www.knchr.org/Portals/0/CivilAndPoliticalReports/2017_Party%20Nominations%20%20Report.pdf
This publication is a compilation and documentation of findings of the KNCHR on the compliance of the 2017 party primaries to human rights standards. The report highlights the areas of concern and gives critical recommendations to key stakeholders on how to mainstream human rights in this important electoral cycle.
Political Campaigns increasingly leading to Electoral Related Human Rights Violations, KNCHR, 13 June 2017
http://www.knchr.org/Portals/0/PressStatements/Political%20Campaigns%20Increasingly%20Leading%20to%20Elections-Related%20Human%20Rights%20Violations.pdf?ver=2017-06-14-124648-960
This advisory brief brought to the attention of the nation the human rights violations that were occurring during the campaigns and further called on the ODPP to reign in on the electoral offenders
Joint update with Constitutional Commissions on upholding
http://www.knchr.org/Portals/0/PressStatements/JOINT%20PRESS%20STATEMENT-KNCHR-CAJ-NGEC-NCIC.pdf?ver=2017-06-27-153542-000
This was a culmination of joint efforts of constitutional commission to come together and address the human rights principles that must be addressed in the
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constitutionalism in the Electioneering period, KNCHR, 27TH June 2017
August Elections and further recommendations on how the rights of special interest groups are to be protected and promoted.
Memorandum to parliament opposing a bill seeking to delete section 14(2) of the Election Offences Act. KNCHR,
http://www.knchr.org/Portals/0/Reports/ADVISORY%20BRIEF%20ON%20PROPOSED%20AMENDMENT%20TO%20THE%20ELECTIONS%20ACT%202016.pdf?ver=2017-08-22-170356-593
The advisory analyzed the legal provisions and strongly opposed the enactment of this bill as it would be contrary to the Constitution. As a result of the Commission’s interventions, the bill was not discussed in parliament.
7. Implementation Challenges and Lessons Learned
Unwillingness by political parties to comply with electoral laws: as explained elsewhere, only 10% of the party lists submitted by political parties to the IEBC had complied with the law. This exposes parties to unwarranted litigation and thus needlessly consuming IEBC time and resources. Political parties also exhibited unwillingness to comply with the law on party primaries leading to the rather chaotic conduct of the same. More focus promoting adherence of parties to electoral law is required
Procurement obstacles: IEBC had sought to procure a firm for rendering strategic communications and advisory services. However, due to litigation over the procurement process, the firm had not been contracted by the end of this quarter. This put considerable strain on the IEBC’s communications department and the Advisor (procured by UNDP) owing to the increasing number and frequency of media crises that keep on emerging ahead of the elections
Delays in a coordinated rolling-out of mass voter education campaigns: legal obstacles in the procurement of a media agency to provide a coordinated voter education campaigns have delayed the much-needed public awareness and sensitization activities of IEBC. Due to this uncertainty, IEBC was hesitant to submit requests for procurement of voter education activities to SEPK. Secondly, even though the Kenya Elections Assistance Programme (KEAP) resumed in the 1st quarter of 2017, the earlier suspension of funding to CSOs had hampered the sustained provision of voter education in many parts of the country. Thirdly, the key voter education providers under the auspices of the Elections Technical Assistance Providers (KETAP) have not had a coordination meetings to harmonize and synergize their actions. For these reasons, it is argued that sensitization of voters has not taken place as envisaged
Congested activity schedules: SEPK had intended to support a voter education drive targeting the mass voter verification exercise. However, numerous requests from IEBC on other critical activities (training of election officials, ESAP, support for PPDT etc) appeared to have crowded-out the procurement of the necessary activities for supporting voter education
Lack of buy-in for the Women Situation Room intervention: Under the UNWOMEN support to CSOs, the project had intended to establish a situation room as a coordination mechanisms for mobilizing support and response mechanism for women candidates during the election period. However, the initiative encountered headwinds following failure to garner the necessary buy-in from the GoK. As a result, the initiative was reprogrammed and recharacterized as the Women Peace and Security Project. Owing to this some delays were encountered in rolling out the activities envisaged
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hereunder.
Litigation risks that could impact on electoral operations: Delays resolution of cases against IEBC over audit of register had impact on finalization of the verification process. Similarly, litigation over the ballot papers tender may affect electoral operations in the next quarter. In turn, these will put on hold requests from IEBC to SEPK over preparations towards support for electoral operations.
Conflicting schedules causing delays in roll-out of key activities: The County and Constituency Trainer of Trainers workshops were to be held in June 2017. However, due to the convening of the National Elections Conference, the project lost 2 weeks and hence all the envisaged ESAP training workshops could not be held on time. The hectic schedules of IEBC Commissioners resulted in the deferment of dissemination of the risk framework to the top echelons of the Commission
Delays in signing of the Letter of Agreement between UNDP and the Judiciary: To facilitate flexible and efficient support to the judiciary and its institutions, UNDP sought to sign a Letter of Agreement (LOA) with the Judiciary. Such an agreement would have facilitated an effective administration of components of work with the Judiciary institutions within this period. While the signature of this administrative instrument is still being pursued, activities were shifted to the subsequent quarter, that pertained to planned interventions with the Judiciary Committee on Elections.
Mismatched demand for electoral justice with available capacity at PPDT: As the filing of disputes with PPDT increased, it became apparent that capacity for the PPDT members to hear and determine the high number of cases was limited given the short time frame. The SEPK unfortunately could not reprogramme resources for additional support to the PPDT, given the limitation of time. In future, the growing quest for electoral justice at the PPDT should be properly anticipated and necessary support (provision of short-term research assistance services) factored into the project.
Limited visibility of SEPK: Even though SEPK has a well-documented communications strategy, the project is not well known among stakeholders.32 The project will institute engagements in the subsequent period that increase visibility while avoiding to supplant the leadership role and independence of IEBC.
8. Gender and Conflict Sensitivity
Introduction:
Democratic elections remain a crucial element in providing the best possible opportunity to ensure women’s voices are heard, their concerns addressed and their contribution to democracy maximized. The UN stands behind women’s equal participation in all aspects of life and supports the formulation and implementation of policies, global standards and norms at both regional and national levels that enhance gender equality and women’s empowerment.
The legal and policy framework:
32 Feedback from lawyers attending sensitization meetings convened by the PPDT
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Significant efforts have been made to increase women’s participation in the electoral process. A robust legal framework in place including the Constitution of Kenya 2010; The Political Parties Act; the Elections Act all contain provisions that seek to augment women’s participation in the electoral process, recognizing the historical, social, structural and systemic barriers that have limited women’s participation in elective leadership.
Women’s participation as voters in 2017:
The EMB has now published the voters register. Out of a total of 19,611,423 registered voters, women comprise 47% as compared to 53% registered men. This presents a reduction in the number of women by 2% from the 2013 baseline of 49% (IEBC 2017). Youth form 51% of the register.
Women’s participation as candidates: Official statistics from the IEBC indicate that women comprise 9.5% (1,358) of the total 14,523 number of candidates now cleared by IEBC for the 2017 elections (IEBC 2017). This is a reduction of 2% when compared to the 2013 baseline when women comprised 11% of all the candidates.
Legal barriers to women’s participation:
Failure to comply to the mandatory constitutional provision that ‘not more than two thirds of members of any elective or appointive position shall be of either gender’. This constitutional provision recognizes that increased participation of women in political leadership, where it has worked (Rwanda, South Africa), was not achieved organically, but was partly the result of affirmative action through legislation. This is particularly useful in FPTP electoral systems which make it difficult to achieve fair representation of women given that it is often characterized by unfair tactics and at times violence. The 11th Parliament proceeded to recess without enacting legislation to implement the 2/3rds gender provision. Thus, Parliament is in contempt of a valid Court Order which has not been varied, set aside or stayed. This principle is a mandatory requirement of Kenya’s electoral system under Article 81(b). It is grounded in the equality and non-discrimination provision in the Bill of Rights. Several attempts have been made since 2010 and at least two Bills presented before NA and Senate. Despite these attempts, the Bill was not enacted owing to quorum hitches or failure to garner the requisite threshold in terms of number of votes cast. The prevailing situation is despite the decision by the Constitutional Court in March 2017 that called on Parliament to enact the legislation ahead of the elections. Hitherto, there have been no less than five other court decisions between 2011 and 2016 that call for enactment of this enabling legislation.
What does this mean/ why is this a concern? 1) Elections are being planned without adherence to the mandatory principle required of the electoral system under Article 81(b) of the Constitution. This carries with it the threat that the electoral process remains open to challenge for non-compliance with this principle. 2) It means that the Parliament thus elected remains open to challenge for having been elected through a process that did not fully comply with the mandatory electoral principle that requires compliance with the affirmative action principle. 3) It means Kenyans need to elect minimum 30% of either gender. This result is unlikely given that women candidates comprise only 9.72% of those cleared for election. It demonstrates a lack of fidelity to the Constitution.
This situation presents the risk of plunging the country in a constitutional crisis after elections. It raises questions as to the legitimacy of a Parliament elected through a process that does not fully comply with the Constitution. Any Kenyan can approach the court to contest the swearing in of the Parliament seek dissolution of Parliament. Ahead of the 2013 elections, there was a legal cover by
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dint of the Supreme Court Advisory Opinion. It permitted the 2013 elections to proceed without compliance but called for enactment of enabling legislation within a specified time limit. The cost of realizing the 2/3rd principle in county assemblies through nomination of women is likely to increase the public sector wage bill as well.
Violence against Women in Elections:
Women aspirants continue to experience significantly high levels of electoral gender based violence (EGBV). Whether physical or psychological, EGBV impedes women’s participation. In some cases, causes women withdraw from the race. Political parties must call to account members who engage in electoral violence/ VAWIE. There must be investigation and prosecution in light of the Electoral Offences Act. The discourse among legal experts should transcend to present evidence that meets the threshold where EGBV can stand as a ground for nullification of an election, in light of prohibition of violence in Article 81. Arising from the nominations earlier in the reporting period, violence was reported against the Kibwezi East MP aspirant, Jessicah Mbalu. The matter was raised before the IEBC tribunal. In Kakamega County, ODM reported that a woman aspirant was attacked and injured by her opponent. The action was reported to the ODM NEB and action was taken. Other attacks witnessed so far in the 2017 election trail involve Embakasi South constituency aspirant Eunice Wambui, Senator Naisola Lesouda (Samburu county), Elizabeth Manyala (MCA Kayole Central Ward) and Rosemary Ogutu (MCA Siaya This was witnessed during the party primaries, where women candidates like Hon. Millie Odhiambo’ s body guard being killed and her rural house being burned.
Gender disparities in media coverage of electoral contestants:
Despite the increasing presence of women in Kenya’s politics, gender imbalance still exists. UNDP and UN Women through SEPK commissioned MCK to monitor media coverage of women in electoral processes. Preliminary findings of this exercise indicate greater coverage on male electoral contestants as compared to women, with 85% of the news reports focusing on male electoral contestants. Only 13% of the news reports featured women electoral contestants. For the remaining 2%, gender did not apply.
Space on newspapers and airtime on TV was found in abundance whenever any of the female contesters was involved in a controversial story e.g. Machakos gubernatorial candidate, Wavinya Ndeti’s troubles in court were given full publicity while her victories to date have been downplayed. The rivalry between Martha Karua and Ann Waiguru were justifiably given maximum publicity as the news value supporting them is conflict – which one would argue, makes for a great human interest story. However, their political agenda for Kirinyaga county and their governance plan has been conspicuously absent.
9. Analysis of Risk and Issues
Type Description and Date Identified
Status Status
Organizational Low confidence in the Judiciary So far, the judiciary is enjoying good confidence due to the way it has handled
On going
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Type Description and Date Identified
Status Status
08-Jul-2017 the announcement of results and printing of presidential ballot papers cases. However, it remains to be seen the extent to which election losers will seek redress from the courts.
Political Presidential candidates refusing to accept results or use court system to contest results 08-Jul-2017
Where malpractice is evident; self-declaration of results; parallel tallying; low confidence in the judiciary. These may heighten political temperatures and lead to violence.
On going
Operational Delay in delivery or inadequate voting materials 08-Jul-2017
Voting materials may be delayed; or inadequate materials may be delivered leading to delayed start of voting and some voters not having a chance to vote. Some contributing factors may include poor road networks, poor logistical planning and deliberate attempt to disenfranchise voters from certain regions. These factors may lead to tension in the polling centres.
On going
Operational Failure of Kenya Integrated Electoral Management Information Systems (KIEMS) 08-Jul-2017
Identification of voters, voting process and transmission of results will be disrupted. Loss and leakage of confidential data; alteration of results announced at the polling centres. These may occasion tensions in the polling stations and after the elections. However, the kits have been lauded as having more than 8 hours battery life, hence power outages may not affect their operation.
On going
Financial Delayed release of exchequer funding to IEBC 08-Jul-2017
The elections are coming shortly after the close of GoK financial year. Exchequer release may delay resourcing of key electoral operations. This may occasion a fall back on donors, especially the SEPK basket, to fund key operations.
On going
Operational Uncoordinated electoral security planning and implementation 08-Jul-2017
More than 1,700 trainers developed to train 180,000 security agencies to be deployed on e-day. Plans for training of security personnel on electoral security
On going
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Type Description and Date Identified
Status Status
are underway.
Operational Low voter education hampering effectiveness of the voting process 08-Jul-2017
VE not started 30 days to elections. This has opened voters to misinformation by politicians. This may affect the number of rejected votes and other voting processes.
On going
Political Political chaos and violence 28-Apr-2017
Potentially divisive rhetoric being spread by politicians e.g. eviction of certain people from various parts of the country. Vigilantes and hire goons being used to disrupt political rallies.
On going
Political Non-implementation of two-thirds gender rule could render National Assembly in constitutional 28-Apr-2017
Parliament adjourned for the 2017 GE without passing the required legislation. This may occasion a constitutional crisis for the 12th Parliament
On going
Political Constant litigation derailing procurement and distribution of strategic electoral supplies. 28-Apr-2017
Key litigation: Announcement of results at constituency level-logistics for IEBC to ensure that this happens; Printing of presidential ballot papers - Re tendering may lead to delay in delivery.
On going
Political Ongoing reform on IEBC 10-Jul-2016
Senate has pass a motion for the creation of a Joint Select Committee to look at the concerns raised against IEBC with a view to disbanding it. Some analysts opine that this will pave the way for a fair and credible 2017 general elections. An issue likely to feature in the debate is the need for verification of results to be done at polling centres instead of a National Tallying Centre.
On going
Political Low public confidence and trust on the Commission by the public impacting on funding. 10-Jul-2016
Ongoing reform of IEBC, which may lead to commissioners and/or senior members of the Secretariat leaving may validate claims that Chairman and some commissioners are corrupt and incompetent. May deepen polarization
On going
Organizational IEBC does not take advantage of IEBC allocated additional Kshs. 21 billion On going
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Type Description and Date Identified
Status Status
technical assistance 29-Feb-2016
for 2017/18 FY. This will diminish the commission's dependence on SEPK support. SEPK needs to be more innovative in its support to IEBC
Political Insecurity and electoral violence 29-Feb-2016
Uwiano has completed a rapid assessment of conflict hotspots in the country. The report will be uploaded once validated and approved.
On going
Organizational IEBC does not undertake the extent of restructuring and reform required 29-Feb-2016
Recruitment of new IEBC commissioners is ongoing and is expected to be complete by 30 November 2016. This was completed in January 2017. The JPSC recommended that secretariat is dealt with based on their terms of contract and prevailing labour laws. It remains to be seen how the new commissioners will handle senior staff who were adversely mentioned during the reform process.
On going
Organizational IEBC ICT issues are not resolved 29-Feb-2016
Procurement, testing and deployment of ICTs may affect the date of 2017 GE if the 6 months directive is to be followed. An amendment to the Election Laws Amendment Act 2016 nullifying the requirement that the 2017 GE must be aided with ICT has been tabled in the National Assembly.
Ongoing
Operational Duplication of efforts with other assistance efforts 29-Feb-2016
SEPK has engaged with IDLO to identify complementarities in implementation of electoral justice activities. SEPK has also shared workplans with IFES to delineate activities for implementation by each project.
Ongoing
Financial Donor fatigue 29-Feb-2016
Donors are keen to understand how the ongoing reform will affect their resources. A special PSC has been convened for Tue 12 Jul
Ongoing
Political IEBC does not regain confidence of all stakeholders, affects trust in 2017 general elections
New commissioners came on board on Feb 1, 2017. Public approval rating of IEBC rose from 28% in January to 33% in
On going
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Type Description and Date Identified
Status Status
29-Feb-2016 February and 70% in April.
Financial Fundraising expected to continue in 2016 to bridge the financial gap. 14-Aug-2015
Contribution agreement for Euro 1 million signed with Italian Cooperation in January 2017. Project funding gap reduced to USD 7 million.
On going
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10. Financial Report
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11. Annexes
Annex 1 – Progress on implementation of EOP
ACTIVITY START FINISH
4.4 Submission of Any Amendments to Nomination Rules 3-Mar-17 30-Mar-17
1.2 Gazette Revised Regulations 25-Mar-17 3-Apr-17
4.7 Gazettement of Candidates and Dates for Party Primaries 30-Mar-17 12-Apr-17
2.14 Acceptance and Delivery of KIEMS 31-Mar-17 10-Apr-17
2.8 Revise the Draft Register Details Based on Field Findings 1-Apr-17 9-Apr-17
5.4 Launch of Pre-Election Voter Education Campaign 1 1-Apr-17 7-Aug-17
2.9 Gazettement of VR Inspection and Verification 3-Apr-17 7-Apr-17
7.3 Returning Officers Sign the Code of Conduct 8-Apr-17 9-Apr-17
1.5 Appointment and Convening Dispute Resolution Committee (DRC)
10-Apr-17 9-Jun-17
4.1 Fundraising by Political Aspirants 8-Dec-16 8-Dec-16
7.15 Procurement, Packaging and Distribution of Strategic Materials
26-Dec-16 6-Aug-17
2.1 Mass Voter Registration Drive 16-Jan-17 6-Mar-17
1.1 Review of Various Regulations 1-Feb-17 28-Feb-17
4.2 Resignation of Public Officers intending to stand for elective posts
7-Feb-17 7-Feb-17
2.2 Diaspora Voter Registration 20-Feb-17 6-Mar-17
2.3 Registration of Prisoners 20-Feb-17 26-Feb-17
4.3 Submission of Party Nomination Rules to the Commission 20-Feb-17 30-Mar-17
5.1 Accreditation of VE providers 25-Feb-17 30-Apr-17
5.2 Accreditation of Domestic and International Observers 25-Feb-17 30-Apr-17
5.3 Signing and Submission of Code of Conduct 25-Feb-17 30-Apr-17
2.5 Uploading MVR Data to Central Database 26-Feb-17 30-Mar-17
2.4 Notice of Suspension of Registration of Voters 7-Mar-17 7-Mar-17
2.6 De-Duplication of the Register of Voters 7-Mar-17 30-Mar-17
4.5 Submission of Political Party Membership List to the Commission
9-Mar-17 27-Mar-17
1.3 Adopt Revised Elections Results Management Framework 14-Mar-17 25-Mar-17
7.1 Notice of General Election 17-Mar-17 17-Mar-17
4.6 Submission of Names of Candidates for Party Primaries to the Commission
26-Mar-17 5-Apr-17
2.7 Forward Draft Register to the Field for Verification 1-Apr-17 1-Apr-17
2.10 Recruitment of Personnel for Verification 1-Apr-17 30-Apr-17
7.4 Review of Polling Stations and Tallying Centres at the 1-Apr-17 14-Apr-17
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ACTIVITY START FINISH
Different Levels
2.11 Audit of the Voter Register 3-Apr-17 21-Apr-17
7.16 Procurement of General Election Transport and Other Services
5-Apr-17 4-Aug-17
7.2 Appointment of County and Constituency Returning Officers & Deputy Returning Officers
7-Apr-17 7-Apr-17
2.15 Prepare KIEMS for Biometric Verification (include loading of data)
11-Apr-17 30-Apr-17
4.8 Parties Conduct Party Primaries 13-Apr-17 26-Apr-17
4.9 Dispute Resolution by Political Parties and PPDT 20-Apr-17 10-May-17
7.6 Gazette Polling Stations and Tallying Centers 21-Apr-17 21-Apr-17
2.12 Submission of Audit Report to Parliament 25-Apr-17 9-May-17
2.13 Implementation of Audit Report Recommendations 25-Apr-17 25-May-17
2.16 Deployment of KIEMS to the Field 25-Apr-17 11-May-17
7.5 National Election Officials Pre-Election Briefing Meeting 25-Apr-17 29-Apr-17
3.1 National Planning Meeting on General Elections 27-Apr-17 29-Apr-17
2.17 Cascaded Training of Verification Personnel 1-May-17 9-May-17
4.13 Submission of Political Party Symbols, Names and Specimen Signatures of Political Party Authorized Persons to Certify Nomination of Political Party Candidates
5-May-17 9-May-17
4.14 Approval by the Commission of Political Party Symbols and Independent Candidates Symbols
8-May-17 9-May-17
4.10 Persons intending to contest in the general elections as independent candidates shall not be members of any political party
8-May-17 8-May-17
4.15 Collection of Nomination papers and Code of conduct 10-May-17 31-May-17
4.16 Commission Transmits Copies of Party Signatories' specimen signatures & Candidate symbols to Returning Officers
10-May-17 11-May-17
4.11 Submission of Independent Candidates symbols, Letter of intent to vie and clearance from Registrar of Political Parties to IEBC
10-May-17 10-May-17
2.18 Inspection and Verification of the Register 11-May-17 9-Jun-17
4.12 Gazettement of names and symbols of independent candidates
13-May-17 13-May-17
4.17 Submission and verification of List of Presidential Candidate Supporters
18-May-17 22-May-17
1.4 Training of Law Enforcement Agencies (Police, Prosecutors ODPP)
22-May-17 22-May-17
4.18 Pre-Nomination meeting with Aspirants 23-May-17 23-May-17
4.19 Nominations for Presidential Elections 28-May-17 29-May-17
4.20 Nomination for Senate Elections 28-May-17 29-May-17
4.21 Nomination for CAW Representatives Elections 28-May-17 31-May-17
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ACTIVITY START FINISH
4.22 Nomination for County Women Representatives 30-May-17 31-May-17
4.25 Lodging of and settlement of Dispute arising from Nominations
30-May-17 9-Jun-17
4.23 Nomination for National Assembly Elections 1-Jun-17 2-Jun-17
4.24 Nomination for Gubernatorial Elections 1-Jun-17 2-Jun-17
7.9 Testing, Simulation, Certification of KIEMS 1-Jun-17 9-Jun-17
7.10 Recruitment of Election Officials (POs, DPOs and Clerks) 1-Jun-17 21-Jun-17
2.17 Amendments to the Register of Voters 10-Jun-17 24-Jun-17
4.26 Publication of Names of all Nominated Candidates 10-Jun-17 20-Jun-17
4.27 Parties Submit Party List Candidates 10-Jun-17 24-Jun-17
7.11 Share List of Successful Candidates with Political Parties and Stakeholders
24-Jun-17 7-Jul-17
2.18 Certification of the Register of Voters 25-Jun-17 1-Jul-17
7.12 Consideration of Political Parties and other Stakeholders Comments
27-Jun-17 7-Jul-17
7.13 Publish Final List of Successful Candidates (POs, DPOs and Clerks)
8-Jul-17 8-Jul-17
2.19 Publication of the Register of Voters (Constituencies, Website, SMS)
10-Jul-17 10-Jul-17
7.14 Preparations and Execution of Cascaded Training of Elections Officials
13-Jul-17 5-Aug-17
7.7 Appointment of Constituency and County Chief Agents 25-Jul-17 25-Jul-17
7.18 Training and Oathing of the Security Agents 2-Aug-17 2-Aug-17
7.8 Appointment of Counting Agents 6-Aug-17 6-Aug-17
7.16 Inspection of Polling Stations and Testing Transmission 6-Aug-17 6-Aug-17
7.17 Display of Poll Register at Polling Station 6-Aug-17 7-Aug-17
7.17 Distribution of Non-strategic to Voting Centres 7-Aug-17 7-Aug-17
7.18 Deployment of Polling Station Personnel, Materials and KIEMS
7-Aug-17 7-Aug-17
8.1 Polling Stations Open 6.00 am - 5.00 pm 8-Aug-17 8-Aug-17
8.2 Counting, Tallying and Announcement of Results at Polling Stations
8-Aug-17 8-Aug-17
8.3 Electronic Transmission of Presidential Results from Polling Stations
8-Aug-17 8-Aug-17
8.4 Collation and Announcement of Presidential Results at the Constituency
8-Aug-17 9-Aug-17
8.5 Tallying, Verification, Announcement and Declaration of Presidential Results at National Tallying Centre
8-Aug-17 14-Aug-17
8.6 Collation, Announcement and Declaration of All Other Results
8-Aug-17 14-Aug-17
8.8 Scanning and Publication of Results Forms 8-Aug-17 14-Aug-17
5.5 Launch of Post-Election Voter Education Campaign 2 9-Aug-17 20-Aug-17
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ACTIVITY START FINISH
8.7 Gazettement of Election Results 14-Aug-17 14-Aug-17
9.2 Re-start of Continuous Voter Registration 9-Sep-17 9-Sep-17
9.1 Second Round Elections (Presidential Run-Off) 14-Sep-17 14-Sep-17
10.1 Post-Election Evaluation 9-Oct-17 13-Oct-17
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Annex 2 – National Conference on Elections Resolutions and Recommendations
The Independent, Elections and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) in partnership with Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC), and Kura Yangu Sauti Yangu (KYSY); and in further collaboration with other institutions and development partners hosted a three day National Elections Conference under the theme: “Working together towards a credible and peaceful general elections 2017” from 12th -14th June 2017 at Kenyatta International Convention Centre (KICC), Nairobi. The objectives of the Conference included: To critically evaluate the state of preparedness among Kenya’s key electoral stakeholders to support and conduct the 2017 general elections; To synergize the efforts and roles of stakeholders in ensuring credible and peaceful 2017 elections; and finally, to rally Kenyans and key stakeholders to commit to credible and peaceful 2017 General Elections. Resolutions of the National Elections the Conference 2017:
1. Recalling that the 2007 elections were characterised with strong ethno-political polarisation, elections mismanagement, and post-election violence that caused loss of more than 1,000 lives and property and the displacement of more than 600,000 people.
2. FURTHER RECALLING that the 2013 elections marked a significant improvement in the management and administration of elections, the electoral commission experienced a crisis of confidence after the elections.
3. NOTING that the 2013 elections were characterised with massive technological failure, delayed results transmission, contested presidential results and unnecessary tension.
4. RECOGNISING the significant changes that have been put in place to for purposes of the 2017 General Election.
5. CALLING upon all political party leaders, stakeholders, and all Kenyans to commit to credible and peaceful elections.
The Conference therefore RESOLVES: ON INCLUSIVE PARTICIPATION
I. THAT IEBC needs to build public trust and confidence in the electoral process for free, fair elections and credible elections. Public engagement and communication should be open, honest and timely to all stakeholders and mandate holders
ACTION: IEBC, Stakeholders
II. THAT IEBC should update the public on the status of voters’ register audit by KPMG. This update should include mechanisms to clean up the register by getting rid of dead voters, and erroneous voter details i.e. missing, shared, erroneous Identifications (IDs)
ACTION: IEBC, Stakeholders (Technical support)
III. THAT in the short term, IEBC should develop guidelines on how to deal with PWDs during elections. This should include user friendly polling centers and booths for the elderly, physically handicapped, the deaf, blind (with ramps, brail & wheel chairs), while specifically targeting youth, women and other marginalised groups.
ACTION: IEBC, Stakeholders, Civil Societies
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IV. THAT there is need for Communications Authority of Kenya to provide assurance that there will be no undue restrictions to public to communication during election.
ACTION: Communications Authority of Kenya, Stakeholders (Technical support)
ON ELECTING LEADERS OF INTEGRITY
V. THAT mechanisms for enforcement of Chapter 6 of the Constitution of Kenya (2010) on
the Leadership and Integrity Act are weak and ineffective. This should include monitoring electoral violence and disqualification of candidates engaged in such violence and hate speech.
ACTION: IEBC, DPP, Civil Society, EACC ON ELECTORAL TECHNOLOGY
VI. THAT IEBC should allow for independent testing of the Kenya Integrated Election Management System (KIEMS) to ensure it meets the highest standards of voter verification, speed, accuracy, credibility and data reliability and transmission of results in temper proof manner
ACTION: IEBC, Stakeholders (Technical support)
VII. THAT IEBC should ensure that the Security and Integrity of electoral technology can be seen through the entirety of the electoral process (registration, identification, voting, counting and tallying of votes). As such the process of procurement of electronic Kit including testing, training, deployment should be transparent
ACTION: IEBC, Stakeholders (Technical support)
VIII. THAT IEBC publicizes the complementary mechanisms as back-up to the electoral technology it has put in place to ensure the continuity of credible election exercise in case of technology failure. This should include verifiable manual registers, results tallying and transmission
ACTION: IEBC, Stakeholders (Technical support)
ON PEACE AND SECURITY
IX. THAT IEBC should develop a mechanism for monitoring electoral violence and process of disqualifying leaders perpetuating hate speech and violence for elections
ACTION: IEBC, DPP, Civil Society, EACC
ON ELECTORAL LEGAL FRAMEWORK
X. THAT IEBC should enforce Elections Act and other constitutional mechanisms to penalize politicians engaged in the use of public resources for political campaigns. Politicians in violation of the law should be penalized including disqualification from electoral process.
ACTION: IEBC, Legislature, Civil Society
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XI. THAT IEBC should put proper preventive and reactive measures for crowd control, specific provision addressing violence against women; accountable policing operations during elections. There is need for IEBC to develop Early Warning mechanisms and collaborate with stakeholders on mitigation measures.
ACTION: IEBC, Religious institutions, Civil Society, EACC
ON ELECTORAL CONFLICT MITIGATION XII. THAT IEBC should develop Dispute Resolution Mechanisms in collaboration with key
stakeholders, religious institutions, and Dispute Tribunals pre-election and Post-Election to ensure simple disputes do not result into violence.
ACTION: IEBC, Religious institutions, Civil Society, EACC ON THE ROLE OF THE MEDIA IN ELECTIONS
XIII. THAT all print, radio, television, vernacular stations, community radios and social media practitioners familiarize themselves with the guideline for elections coverage released by the Media Council of Kenya (MCK). Media houses to make every effort to sensitize their journalists, editors, reporters and news anchor on the imperative of balanced, gender responsive and conflict coverage of and reporting on elections.
Action By: Ministry of Information, CSOs, Media Owners Association, Editors Guild, AMWIK
XIV. THAT Council of Kenya to monitor and report to the Presidency and IEBC on the
performance of media houses, including social media, in promoting national cohesion, balanced, gender responsive and conflict sensitive coverage of and reporting on elections.
ACTION: Media Council of Kenya
GOD BLESS KENYA
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Annex 3 – List of CSO and other partners under the Women in Peace and Security Programme
Advancing Women’s Participation in Preventing Violent Elections
“Putting Women at the Forefront of Peace and Security in Kenya”
IMPLEMENTING PARTNER DESCRIPTION OF INTERVENTIONS
1. Law Society of Kenya Sensitize lawyers on the electoral legal framework, the changes there in and filing on petitions and other electoral disputes
2. Judiciary Training Institute
Longer term capacity building of the Judiciary on effective electoral dispute resolution
3. Media Council of Kenya Development and dissemination of Guidelines on Coverage and Reporting of Elections; Training of journalists and media houses; Media monitoring and reporting; accreditation of journalists and media houses
4. National Police Service Commission
Training of police and other security officers on Electoral Security Arrangement Programme (ESAP) and provision of e-day security.
5. CRAWN TRUST Training of female negotiators on negotiation and mediation skills
Hold advocacy meetings with key stakeholders towards enhancing women’s security in electioneering (Political parties, National Police Service, Article 59 Constitutional Commissions, UWIANO, IEBC, ELOG and Election Center’s)
5000 Women March for peaceful elections and popularization on the Women's rights and importance of enhancing women’s security during the electioneering period (1000 in 5 counties- Nairobi, Nakuru, Uasin Gishu, Kisumu and Mombasa)
Develop and launch a digital platform to populate and disseminate electoral security laws to women aspirants
Advocacy forums and capacity development for community elders, youth and women on mitigation of EGBV for women candidates in Kajiando and Baringo counties through Leadership and Accountability Centers LACs established by CRAWN in the two counties.
6. AFRICAN WOMEN CHILD FEATURES SERVICES (AWCFS)
Hold sensitization meetings with 130 key decision makers in the media-editors and producers in print, online and electronic media-on, inculding journalist on UNSCR 1325 on Women, Peace and Security and specifically on election related violence against women candidates and women voters coverage of this violence and media support in creating awareness on the violence and holding key players the election process accountable. This will be done in Nakuru, Kisumu, and Mombasa.
Support the establishment of online and text platform that will be used to send peaceful election messages and get responses on issues being addressed under UNSCR 1325, specifically on election related gender based violence
Engaging influential bloggers on the advancing women’s security during electioneering period and the need for protection aging EGBV
Training of women aspirants on media and communication skills, both
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conventional and social media online and texting platform to receive and disseminate messaging on WPS and EGBV.
Develop IEC materials to around women’s role in advancing peace and security during the elections- this will be shared between AWCFS and CRAWN Trust who are doing the peace marches
Capacity of 45 media practitioners on conflict sensitive reporting the UN R1325, KNAP as well as electoral related laws.
7. FEDERATION OF WOMEN LAWYERS (FIDA)
Provision of legal assistance, advice, information and court support services (including chain of evidence custody) to EGBV survivors.
Training election monitors to monitor campaigns and elections.
Establishment and coordination of an SMS Platform for electoral violence.
Development and Coordination of a referral platform for electoral violence
8. YOUTH AGENDA (YAA)
Engage youth as active agents of peace through forums in select hotspots on election violence related interventions;
- Base Hangouts (youth Peer to peer as Ambassadors of Peace in the 2017 General Elections in 8 hotspot counties (Kirinyaga, Nairobi, Kisumu, Mombasa, Meru, Muranga, Kajiado, Machakos)
- Establish and operationalize Base Hangouts (youth Peer to peer) in 8 counties
- Interactive and roving Peace Torch - #ChaguaAmani Social Media Campaign (June-Nov)
Establishment and facilitate of Monitoring Network & dissemination of quarterly studies on EGBV
9. TECHNICAL SUPPORT Provide technical support (Staffing) on integrating gender in UWIANO Peace Platform trough deliberate linkage between SEPK and UWIANO interventions on WPS
10. NATIONAL GENDER AND EQUALITY COMMISSION (NGEC)
Multi-stakeholder’s forum on the role of NGEC in the Kenya National Action Plan for UNSCR1325
Monitor legal framework towards 2017 elections and political party primaries on EGBV and audit political party’s constitution and security for Special Interest Groups (SIGs)
Increase intensity to monitor, investigate and handle redress on matters of EGBV under Keeping the Promise campaign in pre-mapped areas where EGBV is likely to occur during campaign and election period in hotspots counties;
Issue advisories to relevant institutions with powers to sanction perpetrators in 4 hotspot counties
Capacity building interventions on election monitoring on EGBV for SIG candidates, for free and fair election
Develop the monitoring tools for the August 2017 elections and deploy to 99 NGEC to monitor EGBV and establish linkages with UWIANO
11. ACORD
MAMA Campaign networked and linked to other internal and like-minded campaigns in the county/country through social media for early warning and response to violence and lesson learning and sharing.
12. GROOTS
Reduction of electoral violence against the women aspirants and candidates, through use of community watchdogs throughout the elections
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- Establishment and capacity building of community watchdogs to map electoral violence against women aspirant and candidate throughout the election period.
- Support establishment of an electoral violence monitoring & response systems
- Mass mobilization of grassroots communities against election violence
13. ALDEF Election barriers affecting women aspirants in Wajir County, including using male champions as a means enhancing women’s protection and security during the election period
14. YIKE
Undertake EGBV training for women candidate’s agents, opinion leaders, security officials, youth leaders, chiefs, etc.
Undertake monitoring and rapid response of cases of violence in informal settlements for women candidate
15. CIFA
Undertake capacity building for women aspirant’s agents, male leaders, security officials, option leaders and youth on EGBV prevention protection and response in Marsabit county.
