Moses Kuria Speaks On MPs Blocking Livestreaming Of 2027 Election

Moses Kuria Proposes Dual Tallying Framework Amid Outrage Over Election Livestreaming Bill

NAIROBI, KENYA — Senior Economic Advisor Moses Kuria has entered the heated national debate surrounding the decision by Members of Parliament to pass a bill eliminating the requirement for live-streaming presidential election results.

The legislative move by the National Assembly has sparked public anger and drawn sharp criticism from legal experts and leaders, including former Chief Justice David Maraga, who urged lawmakers to drop the initiative.

Drawing from his presence during the presidential result tallies at the KICC in 2007 and the Bomas of Kenya in 2013, 2017, and 2022, Kuria offered a historical perspective to bridge the divide between electronic transparency and manual verification.

Rather than abandoning electronic transmission, Kuria advocated for a two-tier tallying mechanism at the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) public portal.

Under his proposal, the country would run two distinct, simultaneous tallies per constituency: a verified tally based on physical Form 34 hard copies and an unverified tally generated directly from initial electronic updates as constituency results are received.

“We need all results livestreamed as the hard copy Form 34s get verified at the National Tallying Centre,” Kuria stated. “As IEBC receives the individual results from the Constituencies, they need to run an unverified national tally at the time of updating the public portal.”

Kuria noted that this dual system would allow observers and citizens to cross-reference counts in real time to spot potential discrepancies.

He added that if the 2027 polls run smoothly without administrative errors, Kenya could transition to a fully digital electoral process by 2032, eliminating the recurring tensions historically associated with the national tallying center at Bomas.