An estimated 9.2 million Kenyans are yet to register as voters, the head of the National Registration Bureau has said. Reuben Kimotho told the Joint Select Committee on electoral reforms the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) can make use of the data held by the bureau as it cleans out the voters register ahead of the next elections.
“The National Registration Bureau has to date registered and issued 26.3 million Kenyans with national identity cards. It should be noted that out of these, 2.7 million are projected dead according to the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics,” he added.
He said the bureau relies on data from the statistics body because not every death and birth is registered in Kenya and so they don’t have accurate statistics. With the IEBC having registered 14.3 million voters, it means that there is still more than half of that number waiting to be registered.
Mr Kimotho advised the IEBC to carry out a mass voter registration before the next elections, adding that the IEBC should perfect the technology used in registering voters, and storing and transmitting data. “For an effective system, the software utilised in all the functionality is synchronised and compatible,” said Mr Kimotho.
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