Kenyan Election Observers Approve Referendum Process, Results

Kenyan citizens overwhelmingly approved a new constitution in a peaceful and credible referendum last week, according to a preliminary statement released by the Elections Observation Group (ELOG), a coalition of civic and faith-based Kenyan organizations.

After the violence that marred the 2007 elections, the successful August 4 referendum was celebrated as Kenyans ratified a new constitution that provides checks and balances on the president, establishes a bill of rights, transfers some powers from the central government to the regions and addresses land distribution issues.

It also eliminates the position of prime minister.

ELOG conducted a parallel vote tabulation (PVT), an election observation tool that provides an independent vote count as a means to promote confidence in the official results. The PVT results, from a statistically random sample of polling stations tracked closely the results released by the Interim Independent Election Commission, which tallied 66.9 percent for and 30.7 against the new constitution.

ELOG also noted it did not observe any major incidents that would mar the electoral process. In fact, in 99 percent of the polling stations it observed, ELOG observers said no one attempted to disrupt the voting process. They also reported a similar percent of polling stations where they observed officials following the referendum guidelines, from opening on time to sealing ballot boxes properly.

“ELOG is confident that the process and the results reflect the wishes of Kenyan voters,” the statement said.

In the months before the referendum, ELOG – with NDI’s support – recruited, trained and deployed approximately 10,000 general observers and more than 500 observers who sent rapid results via text messages to the ELOG database for the PVT. ELOG’s observers monitored the campaign period and on referendum day were deployed in all 210 constituencies.

Since April 2010, NDI has been providing assistance to ELOG to design and conduct the pilot PVT for the referendum, as well as support the formation of a new secretariat and constituency level network, which will work beyond the referendum.