Communications Authority Agrees With Raila On Safaricom And IEBC, Confirms No Cases Of Transmission Failure Were Reported

PRESS RELEASE BY COMMUNICATIONS AUTHORITY OF KENYA (CA) DIRECTOR GENERAL MR. FRANCIS W. WANGUSI ON ALLEGED MANIPULATION OF ELECTION RESULTS BY MOBILE OPERATORS

The attention of the Authority has been drawn to claims attributed to the National Super Alliance (NASA) leadership that the local mobile telecommunications operators were involved in the manipulation of the August 8th general elections results in favour of Jubilee Party.

The Authority is aware that IEBC contracted the three mobile operators to provide a medium of the end-to-end transmission of election results in line with the Elections (Technology) Regulations, 2017.
Upon our advice, the country was divided into three zones and each of the three mobile operators was assigned one region to support the transmission systems of the IEBC. In each of the three zones, an additional mobile operator was assigned the responsibility of providing back up services in case of technology failure.

In line with our oversight responsibility as the ICT sector regulator, the Authority directed the mobile operators to report any cases of transmission failure to us. No cases of transmission failure were reported to us.

As the country prepares for the repeat presidential poll, CA wishes to implore on Kenyans not to lose faith and confidence in technology. ICTs have been successfully deployed and embraced in all facets of life in the country, including banking, business, education, health, agriculture and government services just but to mention a few. Elections are no exception and the Authority is confident that ICTs can be deployed successfully to support this important national activity.

The country stands to benefit in a big way if the current levels of investment and adoption of ICT are sustained. It is therefore the responsibility of all well-meaning Kenyans to support investors in the sector and to underline public confidence in ICTs.

In this regard, we urge political actors to canvass their agenda in a responsible manner in order to avoid putting into jeopardy the impressive investment and other gains that Kenya has made in the local ICT sector. In the same vein, we implore politicians to report any alleged election malpractices on the part of industry players to the relevant law enforcement agencies instead of engaging in blanket ‘lynching’ of investors in this strategic sector.

Issued by,

Francis W. Wangusi, MBS
Director General