Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) has abandoned plans to hold grassroots elections instead of asking branches to pick officials through consensus by Saturday, September 18.
The party's National Election Board (NEB) Chair Catherine Mumma said the decision was arrived at as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The party has asked members to consult and agree on whom to have as officials from ward to county level, instead of following the long often chaotic ballot route.
“We’re giving them two weeks until September 18. All we are doing is talking to them, and walking away to let them agree because we don’t want it to be said that we influenced their decision. Let the members on the ground decide their leadership first,” said Ms Mumma.
She, however, clarified that the party was leaving open the possibility of using the ballot to pick officials where the branches could not agree, or where more than one candidate was fronted for the same seat.
Ms Mumma said Tharaka Nithi, Meru and Embu branches had already presented names of officials to the board for publication.
This week, the board virtually met officials from Tana River and Kwale, where the delegates familiarised themselves with party rules.
Ms Mumma exuded confidence that the consensus route would not disadvantage some members, saying, the party successfully adopted the same method in 2015.
The decision to go the consensus way in 2015 was taken after a chaotic experience in 2014 where a group dubbed Men in Black overturned ballot boxes and scuttled elections in Kasarani, Nairobi.
Registrar of Political Parties Anne Nderitu has asked political parties to abide by the law and conduct grassroots elections before the 2022 General Election.
“Holding party elections is a statutory requirement of Article 91 of the Political Parties Act of 2011. It’s, therefore, a compliance issue,” Ms Nderitu said recently.
No party has conducted grassroots elections since 2017, with most citing the Covid-19 pandemic.
ODM presidential aspirant Jimi Wanjigi has demanded that the grassroots polls be held in public, “and not in some rooms somewhere in secret”.
