Why Kasipul ODM aspirant wants nomination repeated

Kasipul politician Newton Ogada was addressing journalists at Beryl's Hospital in Kasipul Constituency. (James Omoro, Standard).

One of the aspirants who participated in the ODM party nomination for the Kasipul parliamentary seat now wants the party to repeat the exercise over alleged malpractices.

Newton Ogada has expressed concerns that the electoral process was marred by massive irregularities.

Addressing journalists at Beryl’s Hospital in West Kasipul Ward, Ogada said many voters were allowed to vote more than once.

 “The process of voting was marred by numerous irregularities. There were some polling stations where one voter could cast more than five votes in favour of a candidate for the election,” Ogada said.

He also claimed the exercise was riddled with violence.

Five aspirants who included Ogada, George Otieno, Boyd Were, Dr Adel Otoman and Daniel Majiwa took part in the election.

In the election, Were was declared the winner with 18,210 votes. He was followed by Ogada with 3,037 votes.

Majiwa got 621 votes, followed by Dr Ottoman, who got 463 votes, while Otieno came last with 396 votes.

The politicians participated in the exercise to seek an ODM ticket for the Kasipul by-election scheduled for November 27.

Ogada accused the ODM National Election Board of conducting a shoddy nomination.

“The nomination was not free and fair. The figures did not reflect the turnout at the ballot. There were many irregularities which favoured one candidate,” Ogada said.

He added that there were many cases where goons stormed polling stations and flushed out voters to create room for marking ballot papers irregularly in favour of one candidate.

“This is what resulted in multiple voting to inflate the number of voters to favour the candidate,” Ogada said.

Ogada said the act tainted the reputation of the ODM party by jeopardising democracy which the party stands for.

“It is wrong for some people to turn the party to look like their personal property by scuttling democracy in an electoral process. This taints reputation of the party,” Ogada said.

He argued that ODM ought to have been truthful to them.

Ogada also incurred huge losses after his vehicles were damaged by goons during the party primaries.

The goons also vandalised Berils Hospital which he owns.

“I call on security agencies to intervene in this criminal act,” Ogada said.