NAIROBI, Kenya, Jul 14 — The Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) has defended its election technology contractor amid reports it may have mismanaged elections in the Philippines and Venezuela.
IEBC awarded a Sh4 billion contract for supply of Kenya Integrated Election Management Systems (KIEMS) kits to Smartmatic International Holding B.V, a UK-based firm incorporated in Florida US.
Speaking during a jointly produced television interview on Wednesday at the National Tally Centre for the August 9 presidential election, IEBC CEO Marjan Hussein Marjan said no adverse reports were filed during the tendering process against the firm.
“I relied on the evaluation committee report after they did their due diligence and provide me with the report. That’s what I relied on and therefore these things that you are raising right now are things am not even aware about,” Marjan said.
“These issues were never cited in the evaluation report, this it would require the company to respond because I don’t have,” he added.
Marjan also challenged the standing of the information on Smartmatic’s credibility.
“You are actually saying that and it’s not even confirmed. This is information you have obtained by searching on the internet itself and I think it would be proper if the question would be put to the company itself. I cannot speak for it,” Marjan asserted.
Questions on Smartmatic’s credibility stemmed from media reports from the Philippines which indicated anti-cybercrime agency had established the firm’s system was “compromised” during the country’s 2016 election despite finding no evidence of hacking of Commission on Elections server.
A CNN Philippines article published on January 28 quoted Cezar Mancao, the country’s Undersecretary for Cybercrime Investigation and Coordination Center, a Department of Information and Communications Technology.
In Venezuela, the company admitted that the turnout voter system was manipulated with Smartmatic reporting a discrepancy of at least 1 million between the officially declared tally and what the firm recorded.
The controversy around election technology comes at a time leading contenders in the August 9 presidential election have differed on the mode of identification of voters.
While UDA presidential candidate William Ruto has backed the electronic register, Azimio’s Raila Odinga has insisted on a manual register.
IEBC has reiterated its stance on the use of the electronic register as the primary mechanism for identification of voters basing its decision on the Supreme Court decision in the 2017 presidential petition.
The agency has assured that sufficient contingency plans had been put in place including provision of extra KIEMS kits where primary devices fail.
With a highly contested election, the risk of the commission being forced to revert to manual identification due to technological failure might affect the transparency and credibility of elections due to mistrust.
The company has previously strongly defended itself against the accusations, claiming allegations made against it are false and malicious.
“This was so outrageous and crazy,” Smartmatic’s CEO Antonio Mugica, was quoted by Forbes in April 2021 in a rare in-depth interview.
“I thought, no one would believe it,” he reportedly told the press.
Smartmatic was contracted by IEBC to supply up to 10,000 KIEMS kits for use in the upcoming polls as well as provide the software to run the kits.
In 2017, the commission awarded the KIEMS kit tender to OT Morpho, now called IDEMIA, as the technology service provider.
