NAIROBI, Kenya Sep 20 – Vote tallying kicked off in Monday’s by-elections after polling stations in Juja, Makadara and Starehe constituencies closed at 5pm.
In Starehe, most centres closed a few minutes after five o’clock with scores of voters locked out.
“They have just closed and I have rushed from the office hoping to beat the deadline, this is not fair and they should allow us to vote,” said Okoth, a businessman in Nairobi.
“I think they should continue until 8pm. People like us have struggled to get here by 5pm because we were busy at work,” Joseph Kinyua, a casual labourer said.
Parochial polling centre Presiding Officer Mohammed Raka said that the process run smoothly but singled out the low turnout as one of the low points of the exercise.
He is recommending future mini-polls to be held on weekends.
The centre which has 9, 100 registered voters only saw 3,000 of them participate in the exercise.
“I believe the turnout today has been affected largely because it’s been a working day, and most people may not have gotten permission to come and vote,” he said.
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