The nominations chaos in Kenya are not a sign of violence.

  

Date Posted: 1/22/2013 12:55:38 PM

Posted By: jullieflavia  Membership Level: Gold  Total Points: 2188

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It is the hope of most Kenyans that the coming general elections will be peaceful and transparent. As the saying goes, once bitten twice shy. Every Kenyan who witnessed the 2007/2008 post election violence would never like to see a repeat of the same in this year’s general election. However, the primary nominations that were recently held by various political parties may have shown some signs of chaos that Kenyans fear that may be extended to the general elections in March 4th. In my opinion, such chaos was an expression of dissatisfaction and an expression of anger by individuals who felt that their candidates were not the winners. The question here is not about violence or voters being made to riot in support of a candidate. I believe that the voters themselves have come to understand their right s and are ready to fight for the same in bringing in democracy.
Sometimes, rooting out leaders who are not preferred but powerful may be a challenge even to voters. I think that this is one of the reasons why some sense of violence was witnessed in other parts of the country. These problems though should be managed so that an outflow of the same is limited.

I believe that the following ideas may come helpful in addressing these issues.
1. Voter education and sensitization.
The voters are not all educated. There are many students who are illiterate and ignorant about their voting rights. This has made them not to understand what to do, when to do and in essence how to do it. Most of these voters are not aware of their voting rights and they don’t understand the implication of violence during this whole process.
Voter education should try to reach all those voters who need to know what to do during the

election period. It is important to sensitize voters to know their rights and not be used by politicians to get to where they wish to.

2. Transparency in elections.
The elections board or rather the IEBC should also ensure that the elections are carried out in the most transparent way so that the contestants are all satisfied with the results when announced. The elections board must therefore carry the elections diligently to ensure that those who contest for all seats are satisfied and accept the results as they are. This can only be so if the election body is tactful and fair to all.

3. Regulations of hate speech by politicians.
Voters have been known to take what the politicians they follow say or talk about. The politician going for various posts should therefore be made to understand that hate speech and propaganda are not important in making them become winners. They should try as much as possible to preach peace and do it with their hearts to ensure that their supporters don’t make wrong judgments on others.

4. Setting some rules on campaigns.
There is also a need to set some standards or regulations on campaigns. The politicians should not be allowed to give incentives to voters so that they are voted in. I think this should be very tough on politicians because it has been observed that voters are influenced not by the politicians’ manifestos but at some time because of the load of the politician’s pockets.

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