Prepares to go to the polls again
John Ngutai said only three of his 400 staff had shown up for work and there was no security to deliver ballot boxes.
“We don’t have any options,” he told Reuters, as he and two presiding officers sorted thousands of ballot papers into piles, work that should have been completed the previous day.
Kisumu businessman Joshua Nyamori, 42, was one of the few voters brave enough to defy an Odinga call for a stay-away but could find nowhere to cast his ballot in the city of a million on the shores of Lake Victoria.
“I know it’s not a popular move,” he said.
“Residents fear reprisal from political gangs organised by politicians. This is wrong.”
A decade after 1200 people were killed over another disputed election, many Kenyans are braced for trouble although Odinga backed off previous calls for protests and urged his supporters to stay out of the way of police.
“We advise Kenyans who value democracy and justice to hold vigils and prayers away from polling stations, or just stay at home,” Odinga said.
Odinga’s National Super Alliance coalition, which has been accused of harassing polling staff in the runup to the vote, is likely to present a lack of open polling stations as proof the rerun, organised in less than 60 days, is bogus.
The head of the election commission said last week he could not guarantee a free and fair vote, citing interference from politicians and threats of violence against his colleagues. One election commissioner has quit and fled the country.
Kenyatta, the US-educated son of Kenya’s founding father, has made clear he sees today’s vote as legitimate. — Reuters