Economy

IEBC gets Sh8.81bn financial boost for August elections 

Wafula Chebukati

IEBC Chairman Wafula Chebukati. FILE PHOTO | NMG

The National Treasury has allocated an additional Sh8.81 billion for the electoral agency to meet the shortfall needed to conduct the August 2022 General Election. 

The supplementary budget tabled in Parliament on Tuesday shows that the funds will be channeled to the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) to prepare for the looming elections.

IEBC chairperson Wafula Chebukati had on August 9, announced that the commission requires at least Sh40.9 billion to carry out credible elections in 2022.

He said the IEBC needs Sh40.9 billion for the 2022 election expenditure and a Sh588 million to procure Covid-19 items to keep voters safe, making a total of Sh40.917 billion.

The electoral agency had earlier asked Parliament to allocate Sh13 billion in the supplementary budget to meet the shortfall needed to conduct the polls.

In June last year, the acting chief executive Murjan Hussein Murjan told Parliament that the commission had requested Sh40.085 billion for election preparations but the Treasury only allocated Sh33.013 billion leaving a balance of Sh7.07 billion. 

The IEBC however did not give the breakdown of the expenditure.

National Assembly had earlier piled pressure on the IEBC to come clean on the huge expenditures for next year’s polls.

Parliament earlier allocated Sh2.56 billion in the current budget to the IEBC for the ongoing mass voter registration exercise.

The commission aims to register 25 million voters ahead of the next polls, up from the current 19.6 million.

The IEBC has however only registered 18 percent of its targeted fresh voters barely a week to the close of the mass listing exercise. 

The electoral agency for the second time failed to realise its targeted  registered voters in the ongoing mass voter registration exercise which has entered the third and final week.