

RDC: Memorandum du P.L.D. addresse au Gouverment de la R.D. Congo en rapport avec l’annonce de la “mesure de decription politique” (19.08.2016)




“The ANC has officially lost control of the the administrative capital of the country, Pretoria and the Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality. This after the EFF resolved to vote for the DA at all hung councils except where the IFP is leading. This while Ekurhuleni and Joburg remain a conundrum. However, the EFF says it’s agreement with the DA is NOT a coalition” (SABC Digital, 2016)
“Cord leader Raila Odinga has welcomed the joint parliamentary select committee’s recommendations, terming them the beginning of a journey to a free and fair poll next year, whose outcome will reflect the wishes of the electorate. Odinga has however proposed that president Uhuru Kenyatta consults with him in the nomination of new IEBC commissioners, just like he was involved in the appointment of the outgoing electoral body bosses, by former president Mwai Kibaki in the grand coalition government” (Kenya Citizen TV, 2016)

While we see no need to chest-thump as the CORD negotiating team on IEBC reforms, CORD has achieved what we know is critical to delivering a free, fair and peaceful polls next year.
One; what Jubilee intransigence throughout this process has revealed to us is that the much hyped ‘numbers’ by Jubilee are nonexistent. The fear to have a credible electoral institution by Jubilee tells it all.
Having said that; our team has achieved one critical objective that we set to achieve which was, foremost, to have the current crop of IEBC commissioners to go.
We’ve also reduced the number from nine to seven and delineated their roles from those of the secretariat.
We’ve set modalities for getting a new set of commissioners in the most rigorous manner possible which, in our human estimation, should guarantee utmost credibility.
There are finer details to this that we’ll share in coming days.
My experience with Kenya’s democracy project so far is that it is work in progress. Today we give this, tomorrow we get that. It is give-and-take. And while often we wished we had all; that isn’t how it works in reality.
Two; the voter register will be forensically audited. While Jubilee and current IEBC didn’t want anything done on the voter register, and we were adamant the register had to be expunged and a new one instituted; the middle ground was to audit it and should there be ‘multitude of ghosts’ in it; that will automatically lead to a new one.
Three; from next year the country will go for electronic voting. This goes to voter identification, registration, ballot casting, votes transmission and and tallying. Should this system collapse, there shall be no reverting to manual: the election shall be repeated.
Four; we have anchored it in law that IEBC must provide, within 48hrs, all documents it used to declare any candidate a winner. Many of you who followed 2013 presidential petition knows why this is significant.
Finally, there are finer details of what our side has achieved which cannot be reduced to A FACEBOOK post – much as I wished I could – but I felt it was important to clarify that CORD has achieved much, much more; though not all.
In the end; the only way to get jubilee out of power is to VOTE them out of power. This is the next stage.







