Time is now ripe for ‘None of the above’ ballot option in Kenyan general elections

Kenya's general elections planned for August 2012 according to our new constitution, provide an excellent opportunity to introduce a novel voting concept known as ‘None of the above’ (NOTA). This is a ballot option in some jurisdictions designed to allow the voter to indicate disapproval of all the candidates for a particular elective position. It is based on the principle that voter consent in any election requires the ability to say “No”, similar to what happens during referendums. Going by the chaotic, disorganized and quite often violent political nominations that pass for our political parties primaries, its imperative that this proposal be adopted into law as soon as possible by the relevant authorities mandated to oversee the 2012 elections. Allow me to explain.

Unbeknown to most voters, party nominations is actually the place where the integrity of our general elections is most often compromised and not the general elections themselves. A close scrutiny of previous general elections indicates that the disorderly conduct of the nominations is really just a gimmick for the party leadership to impose their preferred candidates on voters irrespective of their popularity.

Anecdotal evidence from the last four general elections strongly suggests that many promising candidates with strong records of integrity have been pushed out of the large parties by their better connected but corrupt rivals, who are often helped along by the party bosses during nominations. These undeserving individuals subsequently go on to win parliamentary or civic seats during the general elections under the infamous but euphoric ‘three-piece’ voting style. That is, electing your MP and Councillor based on the party of your favourite presidential candidate without any consideration to individual merit.

May I add at this point that overall voter scrutiny of candidates is bound to get worse in 2012 with the introduction of five elective positions at the ballot (Constitution of Kenya, 2010: cap 7-9). In addition to the President and Members of Parliament, voters will be expected to elect a Governor, a Senator, and County assembly representatives. These are five elections in a single day! Tragically, this is likely to result in a new ‘five-piece’ voting style.

Most voters will simply not care to check the individual profiles of the many candidates in their counties but are likely to choose based on their preference for national president and his or her party. Many undeserving candidates will therefore find their way into leadership positions by simply hiding behind a popular presidential ‘wave’ in their counties. I don’t have to provide details of the massive looting of county resources and stagnation that is likely to become the legacy of these ‘leaders’.

However, there’s one trump card the uncompromising Commission for the Implementation of the Constitution (CIC) led by Charles Nyachae can still do to earn their place in our history books – the introduction of a slot in the ballot paper for ‘none of the above’ or NOTA. This is for voters who feel dissatisfied with the quality of candidates on offer at the general elections and do not want to abstain from voting. Quite often, and this is really pathetic, many voters are compelled to choose the ‘lesser of the devils’ on offer - in short, candidates they dislike. If we had this option in the 2007 elections, I would certainly have voted for NOTA at the presidential level rather than abstaining.

In countries where this novel idea has been implemented (such as Greece, the United States of America and Spain), if the NOTA option obtains a winning majority, the election in that particular locality is nullified and another election must take place. All previous candidates are subsequently disqualified from participating. And really why not? Most voters would have sent a clear message that the candidates on offer were flawed. Despite the apparent additional costs arising from a subsequent by-election, the benefits are simply incalculable.

Besides encouraging voter turnout, this mechanism would offer voters a second golden chance to elect a more deserving leader, and for political parties to style up and nominate individuals with credible leadership records. Most important, the country would save billions that would otherwise be lost through future financial scams engineered by corrupt ‘leaders’, and the expensive investigations and litigation processes that are sure to follow such incidents. The introduction of NOTA into our ballot papers is long overdue.

Integrity and local government leadership in Kenya

Local Authorities in Kenya have continued to suffer due to poor leadership over the years. Various schools of thought have put forward different theories to explain the phenomenon of lowly qualified people, some barely literate, being elected to manage our County, Municipal and City Councils. Whether the problem is due to voter ignorance, an archaic Local Government Act 265 or simply an arbitrary chance occurrence unique to Kenya, the long and the short of it is that residents of these local authorities have ended up receiving a raw deal from leaders whose only motive seemed to have been to enrich themselves at the expense of their voters.

Nearly 50 years since Independence, as many as 75% of our local authorities have been declared financially insolvent due to mismanagement and gross corruption. Speaking at an Association of Local Government Authorities of Kenya (ALGAK) event in November 2009, the Deputy Prime Minister and Local Government Minister Hon Musalia Mudavadi admitted that out of the 175 Councils in the country, less than 45 could sustain themselves financially. The Minister said most of the Councils were in the red and were a liability to the Exchequer, adding that they were formed for political expediency and not economic viability. He added that the government was planning to reduce these Councils to 46 by the 2012 general elections (Source - Daily Nation, Tuesday, November 25, 2009).

This tragic state of affairs is clearly illustrated by scandals at City Hall such as the cemetery saga that took down Mayor Geoffrey Majiwa. He resigned in disgraceful fashion after his arrest and subsequent indictment by KACC officials on October 25th 2010. According to KACC spokesman Nicholas Simani the Mayor was charged with conspiracy to defraud the public and willful neglect to perform official duty as stipulated in the Penal Code. The Nairobi City Council stood to lose nearly Ksh 300M from the irregular purchase of the highly inflated cemetery land. The land was said to be worth less than 10% of that amount. The Local Government PS Sammy Kirui (now suspended), former Nairobi Town Clerk John Gakuo and other senior Ministry officials were also implicated in the deal. (Click to see news video).


Former Nairobi Mayor Geoffrey Majiwa at the Nairobi Law Courts on Tuesday 26th October 2010. Photo credit: Evans Habil/Standard newspaper.

The foregoing is just the tip of the iceberg for similar shady operations in our local authorities documented over the years. Remember the case of the Nairobi Mayor who was said to have stolen the Mayoral golden chain back in the late 90s, and sold the same in Paris for Ksh 150M? Last time I checked, he was running for the Embakasi Parliamentary seat during the 2007 elections. Remarkably shameful I might say.

It’s inevitable to ask at this point whether local government leadership in Kenya has ever recognized integrity as a critical value that all Councillors are required to have. The same can be asked of Kenyans voters. Seriously, it’s high time that people aspiring to be Councillors or County representatives for that matter be evaluated on their record of integrity come next year. Moreover, chapter 6 of our new constitution focuses on integrity as a requirement for all aspiring political leaders and public officials. We really don't have a choice on this issue if we are to move the country forward in the right direction.

A simple reading of the dictionary defines integrity as the quality of being honest and having strong moral principles. In my opinion, this value in our leaders is perhaps more important and profound than educational qualifications or managerial competence. The moral uprightness of our local government leaders needs to be put under a microscope if we are to exorcise the demon of corruption from our local authorities. As KACC has belatedly discovered, education and technical competence will simply not do unless we examine the moral standing of aspiring candidates in 2012.

In the United States for example, voters established ages ago that a known philanderer can never be entrusted with taxpayers money. That’s why their leaders are publicly asked to resign when their extra-marital love affairs are exposed. The logic from the public is simple - if you can cheat on your wife, you will certainly rip-off the taxpayers without any hesitation. With the culture of mpango wa kando deeply entrenched in Kenya, it would be very interesting to see how this particular moral criterion would play out in our country.