As Kenya goes to the polls Monday with the hopes of transforming the country’s leadership both at the top and the bottom, a 72-year-old woman who wanted to be part of the change has died. The woman collapsed and died while waiting to vote at Kaganda Primary School polling centre in Kiharu, Muranga County.
The major political alliances are currently battling for the votes in a total of 17 regions; Bungoma, Central Eastern, Central Rift Region, Garissa Region, Kakamega Region, Lower Eastern, Mandera Wajir, Nairobi, Coast, North Rift, Nyanza Central, Nyanza South, Nyeri Region, South Coast, South Rift, Thika Region, and Upper Eastern.
According to the opinion polls Raila Odinga has had a sustained command in the Nyanza and Western Provinces, Coast province, Eastern Province, Nairobi Province and North Eastern Province.
Under this provinces the expected voting patterns shall be as follows Bungoma, Lower eastern, Mandera Wajir, Nairobi, South Rift, Nyanza south, central, Coast and Garissa region are likely to vote in the favour of the premier.
In the final register the county is said to have 800,000 plus voters however according to the register by December 18 it had 860,716 which represent 113.7 per cent.
People will support the alliance because of Raila’s reform agenda i.e. the new constitution and the devolution of government and most communities will vote for the alliance to continue with the reform process which has seen the alliance opinioned to be the most popular during the campaign trail.
Throughout the campaign trail the CORD alliance has had an upper hand in terms of support and therefore it’s expected to do well in today’s polls.
The Raila strongholds are identified as Kisumu, Siaya, Migori and Homa Bay. Kakamega, Busia and Vihiga are considered Mudavadi strongholds while Kitui, Makueni and Machakos belong to Kalonzo.
Voting patterns may recur since no one is incumbent. Back in the last elections Raila Odinga got 75 per cent of the 1,149,343 votes cast in Kakamega, Busia and Vihiga, while the incumbent Mwai Kibaki 24 per cent of the vote.
His backyard Kisumu has also proved to vote as a block and therefore in the 2007 vote Raila got 97 per cent of the 1,052,515 votes in Kisumu, Siaya, Homa Bay and Migori while Kibaki got three per cent and Kalonzo 1,143 votes.
In Ukambani the Kamba people are said to deliver a block vote for Raila Odinga owing to the fact that they voted a clean 88 per cent of the 798,708 votes in Kitui, Makueni and Machakos to Kalonzo Musyoka and Mwai Kibaki got 10 per cent due to the strong team he had in Ukambani.
All eyes are now set to Water Minister Charity Ngilu whether she will deliver a vote to Uhuru Kenyatta from a region where Wiper Democratic Movement is like a religion.
Whatever happens, people want change, and that’s why Kenyans of all ages have trooped out to vote. Even the old women were spotted on long queues waiting to vote. Despite news of the death of the 72-year-old woman, grannies are bent on voting before leaving the queue.
