Details of how the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) CEO Ezra Chiloba told off his own Chairman Wafula Chebukati when he tried to throw him under the bus over conduct of August 8 election have emerged.
In a counter-memo never shared to the public, Chiloba picked on Chebukati for attempting to isolate the secretariat for blame, questioned his concentration span, faulted his IT knowledge and trashed most of the claims in the initial memo.
Chiloba is exiting the commission tomorrow (Monday) on a month-long leave of absence triggered by Chebukati’s veiled Wednesday ultimatum on him to quit. The responses have been the bedrock of Chiloba’s continued stay at the commission despite pressure on him to quit.
Review and analysis
“The election was conducted by the commission comprising of commissioners and the secretariat, who by law bear joint responsibility. This explains why in the petition, both the chair and the secretariat personnel filed affidavits in response to the various allegations,” Chiloba wrote on the outset of the response.
Before he could even delve into the 12 issues raised by the chair, the CEO appeared suspicious of the memo, its origins and purpose. He claimed it was drawn from a report or information which had not been availed for full review and analysis.
On the 12 points, Chiloba tore on the chairman like a wounded lion. To the claims of Chebukati’s username was used to undertake 9,934 transactions, Chiloba rolled it over back to Chebukati, reminding him of a briefing where it was explained to him what would happen with his username.
“I have followed up the issue with the ICT team and the feedback I have is that they were also not fully satisfied with the level of concentration during the briefing. In essence there was a communication problem that must be addressed going forward,” he said.
The CEO was referring to an August 7 briefing between the commission’s ICT team and the commissioners at Bomas of Kenya in which the commission was allegedly taken through the workflow of the Forms 34Bs.
Chiloba also reminded the chair of a July 25, 2017 commission meeting which approved the workflow and which indicated that two designated staff would be appointed to download Form 34Bs from the system on behalf of Chebukati since it was a clerical function.
“I understand the 9,934 transaction log activities are proper since they relate to normal access and retrieval functions in the context of the secure SFTP, and therefore, there should be no cause for worry,” he signed off the matter.
Chebukati’s claims on switching off of geo-fencing and GPRS features were rebuffed with a small lecture: “First all, I am informed that GPRS and Geo-fencing features mean different things. GPRS means the 2G/3G/4G feature on the device. This feature was always on for the purposes of transfer of data.”
On the geo-fencing, Chiloba claimed that it was never part of the KIEMS kit requirement and that it could not have been switched off since it was never there in the first place.
Chiloba also took on Chebukati for alleged contradiction of the commission position with regards to the invalidated results. He said his memo to the commission secretariat and the chairman’s public statement at the same time served different purposes.
His was to “motivate” staff in the face of the Supreme Court verdict while Chebukati’s was to reassure the public that the commission was taking the decision with utmost seriousness.
In his memo circulated to staff on the day Supreme Court delivered its verdict, Chiloba urged them to take the court decision in stride, thanked them for doing their best, urged them not “to lose perspective” and asked them to be prepared “to serve again when called upon.”
“We are not aware of any massive failures of the devices. Indeed, reports obtained from Field ICT Officers show that deployment of satellite devices was a major success,” Chiloba said of the chairman’s inquiry on why Sh848 million worth of satellite phones were not used.
On printers and scanners which allegedly failed to work, Chiloba too was blunt: “Based on the feedback received so far, there were no notable failures that significantly impaired the required process.”
A similar response was proffered on claims that 595 polling stations did not send results: “We are not aware of any polling station that failed or refused to send results to the commission.”
Porous system
Chiloba, however, agreed with Chebukati that more than 10,000 polling stations transmitted text results without forms. However, he said the Form 34B’s were eventually submitted to the national tallying centre.
“As long as the legal framework and the network connectivity across the country remains as they are, the practical realities are such that there shall always be challenges with instantenous transmission of results forms from all polling stations,” Chiloba’s response says.
On alleged porousness of the SFTP system used to transmit the Form 34B’s, Chiloba was stubborn that they were never porous. Again, he lectured the chair on the unique features of the system in their technical terms.
“At no point did the commission recommend use of alternative mechanism such as IP address as alluded in your memo. I am informed by the ICT team that IP address system is a unique machine identifier and as such not an alternative to SFTP deployed by the commission,” he told the chair.
Chiloba also took on the chair on his other queries on rejected votes, validation of voters and network coverage.
