IEBC to Expunge 1.18 Million Voters from the Register

Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) is set to remove at least 1.18 million names from the voters’ register ahead of the August 9th general elections.

This is after a preliminary audit report by KPMG raised a number of issues in the voters’ register that need to be addressed before the final draft is certified and published. 

The register contains 246,465 deceased voters, 481,711 voters who have been registered more than once, and 226,143 voters registered with IDs or passports that do not validly belong to them, according to the preliminary audit report. 164,269 people were found to have registered with invalid identification documents (IDs and Passports).

IEBC Chairperson Wafula Chebukati says the commission will receive the final audit report on June 16th before engaging stakeholders on the final register of voters the next day.

As a result, IEBC has deferred the date of publishing the register of voters from June 9th to June 20th to give it more time to address the findings from the audit report.

Last week, UDA party presidential candidate William Ruto alleged that about a million names from regions considered his strongholds had been expunged from the voters’ register as part of an alleged plan to rig the upcoming elections in favor of his competitor. 

But Chebukati dispelled Ruto’s allegations and assured Kenyans that the register is intact and has not been compromised.

“…I want to state clearly that the data on registered voters is intact. I want to assure Kenyans that the register is intact, safe and there has been no breach,” he said.