Consolata Maina, Margaret Mwachanya, and Paul Kurgat quit the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) this week and it has emerged that the three met top government officials prior to their resignation.
The Standard reports that the commissioners met a senior politician, a senior State House official, a Cabinet Secretary, a Principal Secretary and a senior intelligence officer on Saturday before making their announcement.
According to sources, the Cabinet Secretary was tasked with inviting the commissioners to a meeting following the fallout at the commission that was escalated by the suspension of CEO Ezra Chiloba a week earlier.
He, however, did not manage to achieve this and an announcement on their resignation was made.
[caption caption="Paul Kurgat, Margaret Mwachanya and Consolata Maina"]
[/caption]
The commissioners cited chairman Wafula Chebukati's failure to give proper leadership as one of their reasons.
"The Commission Chair has failed to be the steady and stable hand that steers the ship in difficult times and gives directions when needed," declared the officials.
In a statement read by Ms Mwachanya, the commissioners announced: "The institution has continued to be dysfunctional with arbitrary decision-making, leaking of internal documents to serve personal goals and pursuing personal interests.
"All of which are against the laid down laws that govern the conduct of the Commission leadership and staff," they asserted.
The poll body has been facing pressure from all quarters in recent days and on Wednesday, the Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) backed the decision to send Chiloba on a three-month compulsory leave.
“The country must go back to the drawing board to relook at the entire architecture of Kenya’s electoral body.
“As a party, we fully support the investigations commenced by the commission and the action taken to send the CEO on compulsory leave to enable those investigations to be conducted without interference," ODM secretary-general Edwin Sifuna stated in a statement.
[caption caption="Edwin Sifuna"]
[/caption]
