Days after terminating the Kenya Integrated Elections Management System (KIEMS) tender, Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) has now opted to procure the technology directly from a French firm, Safran Identity and Security, previously Morpho.
IEBC chairperson Wafula Chebukati said Friday the firm was selected for a number of reasons that include legal and operational timelines, even as he reassured the country that the commission will use KIEMS for the August 8 polls as provided for in the law.
He said the commission has very limited time to comply with the legal timelines in relation to deployment of ICTs in elections, adding that adequate time is required for purposes of configuration, testing, training and deployment for purposes of voter verification exercise required by May 10. He, however, added that Safran has undertaken to deliver the technology within the statutory timelines.
The commission has also undertaken the services of Safran Identity and Security owing to standardisation, compatibility and project management. Chebukati said so far, more than 19 million voters have been registered using a stand-alone system provided by the same company.
During the register preparation, Safran is supporting the Commission to ensure that the country has credible and reliable biometric voters register to be used in 2017 election. “The commission has a preventive and maintenance contract for the BVR system with Safran for the next three years.
We are confident that using Safran at this point, there is guarantee for compatibility, timely delivery and accountability in the deployment of the new system,” said Chebukati.
“The commission decided to terminate the tender. In so doing, the commission took into consideration its statutory obligation in preparing for elections, procurement procedures, value for money and timelines to guarantee delivery of a free, fair and credible election...Since termination, the commission has taken steps to directly procure the required Kenya Integrated Elections Management System (KIEMS) from Safran Identity and Security,” he said.
Chebukati said the commission has learned from mistakes of 2013 election and are building on the strengths. He said the commission decided to engage Safran Identity and Security to ensure that statutory timelines are met, to have sufficient project management capacity and ensure the systems are fully compatible and integrated for the success of the elections noting that any other way will jeopardize preparations for the elections.
He said the amended Elections Act 2011 requires the commission to deploy an integrated elections management systems for voter registration, voter identification and results transmission and that the commission is committed to abide by this requirement and wishes to assure Kenyans that this technology will be used on August 8.
In order to meet the legal timelines for the procurement and putting in place the technology required for the elections, the commission advertised for the tender for the KIEMS on December 16. However, the process was stopped due to an order issued by the Public Procurement Administrative Review Board (PPARB) on December 29, following an application by a prospective bidder.
The order was lifted on January 17. A total of 10 companies submitted their bids. One company, M/s Gemalto SA, qualified for technical evaluation but as the evaluation was going on, another order stopping the procurement process was issued by PPARB on February 22 following an application by another bidder. It was dismissed on March 9 and on March 17, the commission concluded the financial evaluation as ordered by the review board.
Chebukati said after conclusion of the financial evaluation, the commission noted that the only technically evaluated bidder quoted a price of Sh5.2 billion against the available budget of Sh3.8 billion.
And taking into account the remaining processes of the tender procurement, the manufacturing, delivery, installation and commissioning, Chebukati said it would have been impossible for the commission to meet its operational and legal timelines.
“Over 19 million voters have already been registered using the current BVR system. The next priority is to ensure that components of voter identification and results transmission are integrated with the existing voter registration database,” said Chebukati.
On party primaries, Chebukati said the commission is aware that the court has suspended operation of Section 28 of the Elections Act, which has an impact on the issue of political party membership lists.
However, he said the court order does not pronounce itself on the issue of submission of membership lists to the IEBC and are optimistic that the judgment to be delivered on March 29 will be done expeditiously to avert delays in the legal timelines.
The party membership list is required for a number of reasons including confirming to the commission who is or is not a member of a political party to avoid disputes from political parties contending that some candidates cleared by the commission to vie are not members of the political party which supposedly nominated them.
The lists are also necessary in order to determine under Section 29 of the Elections Act whether a presidential candidate has submitted the requisite number of supporters, that is, 2000 supported from at least 24 counties who are members of the party in question.
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