Former IEBC Chairman Issack Hassan has revealed how Opposition leader Raila Odinga ganged up with civil societies to frustrate him over election rigging claims.
In sections of his forthcoming memoirs on Electoral Democracy in the Commonwealth, the former IEBC Boss stated that after declaring President Uhuru Kenyatta as the winner of the 2013 General Election, Odinga singled him out and former Chief Justice Willy Mutunga for “a special criticism”
Hassan stated that the Opposition Chief filed a petition in Parliament for the removal of IEBC officials from office in 2014, but it was dismissed on grounds that it lacked merit. He filed a similar petition in 2016 but it was dismissed.
“In a country with no culture of conceding electoral defeat, three-and-a-half years were spent by these Opposition leaders honing a sense of victimhood to the effect that the presidential elections were rigged,” Hassan stated.
“The Chief Justice, perhaps fed up with the whole public lynching, chose to retire early one year before his term ended. However, we did not have that option," he added.
Hassan further stated that Odinga sponsored a petition for a referendum for Kenyans to disband and reconstitute IEBC. The petition was to be signed by at least a million registered voters, but the electoral body had only 800,000 registered voters at the time hence thwarting the move by the opposition.
Hassan also narrated how public protests were staged at the IEBC offices every Monday with the demonstrators carrying offensive banners such as ‘IEBC Must Go’, ‘We don’t want thieves’, ‘Jubilee equals IEBC’, ‘Isaack Hassan go back to Mogadishu’, ‘Wanted dead or alive – Isaack Hassan’.
“It was clear to everyone that we had become sacrificial lambs,” Hassan stated.
The IEBC Boss said that he found it necessary to step down from office on January 20 after serving for seven years and 10 months so as to avoid a looming political confrontation and also save the institution from further “cannibalization”.
He handed over the mantle to a fresh Commission chaired by Wafula Chebukati with six other commissioners namely Boya Mulu, Margaret Mwachanya, Roselyn Akombe, Consolata Nkatha, Paul Kurgat and Abdi Guliye.
The new Commission has also had its fair share of gruesome battles with the Raila-led Opposition brigade. Like the Issack Hassan-led team, Wafula Chebukati and his officials have been hounded to the Supreme Court over results of the Presidential election in which they are accused of abetting massive rigging in favour of Uhuru Kenyatta.
