IEBC in dilemma over deputy CEO

The recruitment of five officials including a deputy Chief Executive Officer at the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) is facing hurdles, The Standard has established.

IEBC faces a legal challenge following a court order that reinstated Deputy CEO Wilson Shollei (Support Services) in November last year. Mr Shollei is yet to return to office, and on Friday his lawyer Edwin Sifuna moved to court seeking to commit the IEBC commissioners to civil jail for defying the court order.

On November 18 last year, Justice Maureen Onyango declared the sacking of Shollei as null and void and ordered he be reinstated pending the conclusion of a corruption case against him.

The judge, however, declined to restrain IEBC from interviewing, sourcing or employing any other person to undertake Shollei's duties.

"We have not sat as a commission to decide on the implications of the order but we will meet soon to review the orders," Commissioner Thomas Letang'ule told The Standard while acknowledging the dilemma in the appointment of the Deputy CEO.

IEBC has been in the process of filling key posts since late last year as it tries to position itself for the next general election. Other than Shollei's position, the commission wants to hire three directors and two managers.

The directorates include Finance, ICT and Voter Education & Partnerships while the two managers are Procurement and Voter Education.

Following the recent hiring of a new CEO by the commission, Ezra Chiloba, attention has now shifted to the other positions that fell vacant following the dismissal or resignations of a number of senior management staff.

New commissioners

While this is happening, there have been unheeded calls, from among others, CORD and civil society organisations to restructure the commission and hire new Commissioners and staff.

IEBC has shortlisted 12 persons from the position of Deputy CEO, 11 for Director of Finance, 12 for Director of ICT, 11 for Director of Voter Education & Partnerships, 11 for Manager, Voter Education and 9 for Procurement Manager.

These were picked from a list of 96 applicants (Deputy CEO), 43 applicants (Director-Finance) 36 applicants (Director-ICT), 214 (Director-Voter Education), 571 applicants (Manager, Voter Education) and 40 (Manager Procurement).