The Independent Electoral and Boundary Commission (IEBC) has come out to defend conttaracted firm Smartmatic Technologies amid election fraud allegations.
In a presser releazed dead in the night, IEBC Chair Wafula Chebukati stated that the elections body conducted due dilligence in selecting the firm.
“Smartmatic has been a partner to various election commissions across the world such as in Belgium, Estonia, Los Angeles County in the U.S., and Zambia amongst others. It has implemented technologies for election commissions in five continents being North America, South America, Africa, Europe and Asia, cumulatively recording and tabulating 6.5 billion votes.”
Chebukati added that all the cases challenging Smartmatic have been handled all the way to the Supreme Court.
“The award of the contract was contested at the Public Procurement Administrative Review Board (PPARB), the High Court, the Constitutional Court and the Court of Appeal. However, the Commission’s decision was upheld in all the court cases.”
The IEBC is locked in a battle with the DCI over its contractor’s move to carry election stickers in his personal belongings.
The three venezuelans are under investigation after they arrived in the country in expired passports, and their faulure to declare the election stickers as part an important cargo.
IEBC added that the stickers were non critical and would only be used to label the KIEMS kits.
“For easy identification of the KIEMS kits, Smartmatic is required to provide stickers to aid in labeling each of the kits for purposes of packaging and dispatch to all polling stations.”
“It is important to note that the stickers are non-strategic election materials. The stickers were printed based on the details of the gazette notice published on 1st July, 2022.”
However, Chebukati had not indicated why the Smartmatic officials decided to bring the election stickers as part of personal luggage, a matter which the DCI questioned.
