Chebukati evades critical issues raised by DCI in his response over the Venezuelans’ saga
2 min readChebukati evades critical issues raised by DCI in his response over the Venezuelans’ saga, instead defending the individuals arrested at the JKIA.
Wafula Chebukati, the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission chair, has backed Smartmatic International Holdings and insisted that the agreement with the Dutch company was legal.
The election commission said in a statement dated July 26 that Smartmatic International beat five other companies to obtain the lucrative contract in 2021.
Chebukati further justified Kenyan company Seamless Limited’s participation by saying that they are collaborating with the Dutch company to supply essential technologies needed during the next elections.
“One of the conditions in the tender document was that the bidder should provide a detailed support and maintenance plan and attach documentary proof of ICT technical support staff with a local registered office in Kenya. Smartmatic complied with this condition by providing a local partner in the country,” the IEBC statement read in part.
At the same time, Chebukati justified the arrival of election materials seized at the airport, including stickers that were seized with the Venezuelan nationals at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA).
In his statement, IEBC Chair Wafula Chebukati said the stickers are not strategic election materials.
“For easy identification of the KIEMS kits, Smartmatic is required to provide stickers to aid in labeling each of the kits for purposes of packaging and dispatch to all polling stations. The deployment of the KIEMS kits is currently underway.
“It is important to note that the stickers are non-strategic election materials. The stickers were printed based on the details of the gazette notice published on July 1, 2022,” IEBC explained.
Chebukati evades critical issues raised by DCI
However, in his statement Tuesday, Chebukati evaded several questions raised by DCI boss George Kinoti in his Sunday statement.
The Director of Criminal Investigation (DCI) George Kinoti had called out IEBC for not being mean with the truth about the activities of the three foreigners, challenging him to put his house in order.
The DCI also claimed that the two Venezuelans were not Smartmatic officials and had traveled to the country with expired passports.
IEBC in their statement argued that the Venezuelans were contracted to help in the ICT sector and deployment of KIEMS kits.
The Venezuelans were nabbed with stickers belonging to 10 counties raising eyebrows about the credibility of the electoral process.
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