NAIROBI, Kenya – A spokesman for Kenya’s main opposition group said Friday that armed and masked police raided their vote tallying centres, intimidating workers and seizing equipment ahead of next week’s presidential polls.
Workers at the centres counted up to 30 men in hoods who took away computers, servers, cellphones, surveillance cameras, notebooks and ID cards, according to Dennis Onyango, a spokesman for the National Super Alliance.
“The raiders did not present any warrant of arrest. They jumped over the fence and demanded total co-operation from the terrified young employees, warning that non-co-operation could result in shooting and murder,” Onyango said.
There was no immediate comment from government officials late Friday night.
The ruling Jubilee Party had opposed the opposition setting up an alternative tallying centre for Tuesday’s election but later said it would have its own.
The National Super Alliance has accused President Uhuru Kenyatta of wanting to rig the vote, an allegation that his office has denied.
Opposition leader Raila Odinga lost to Kenyatta in the 2013 elections and challenged the result in the Supreme Court, arguing that electronic transmission of results and biometric identification had been intentionally allowed to fail, opening up room for tampering with the manual transmission.
For this election the National Super Alliance said it would run a vote-tallying operation parallel to the electoral commission’s.
Deputy President William Ruto alleged in March that the opposition wants to declare itself victor by using its own tallying centre.
