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2017 KENYA ELECTIONS

Concern over high number of rejected ballots in 2017 polls

IEBC on Thursday said that they had noted the outstanding number of the rejected votes and would be looking into the matter once the election process is over/FILE

NAIROBI, Kenya, Aug 11 – The just concluded General Election has seen thousands of votes being rendered invalid with the rejected presidential votes standing at 401,003 as at Friday evening.

The Chairman of Kenya National Commission on Human Rights Kagwiria Mbogori in an interview Capital FM News that the high number of rejected votes was as a result of new voters who had not gone through the voting process before, saying that civic education was important especially in rural areas.

“When we talk about rejected votes it means that some people were marking outside the ballot box or double marking in that case that vote automatically becomes spoilt,” said Mbogori.

The Head of the European Union Election Observation Mission to Kenya, Marietje Schaake on Thursday spoke during a press conference in Nairobi and stated that there was need to look into the issue of the spoilt votes since the number was alarming.

“When it comes to the spoilt ballots, this is indeed something that has stood out and there could be a number of reasons for it and it is important that those are followed up,” Schaake said.

IEBC on Thursday said that they had noted the outstanding number of the rejected votes and would be looking into the matter once the election process is over.

“There is about 2 per cent of rejected votes. So far, we have not done a deeper analysis to understand why the number is like that or if it’s accurate, we will do analysis once the forms 34As are verified,” IEBC Chief Executive Ezra Chiloba said.

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