A coalition of political parties, civil society groups and professionals has launched a fresh bid to overhaul electoral laws, seeking sweeping changes how 2027 presidential election results should be handled.
The People’s Coalition on Electoral Reforms, co-convened by former Chief Justice David Maraga, former National Assembly Speaker Justin Muturi and Suba South MP Caroli Omondi, wants Parliament to amend Section 39 of the Elections Act to move the presidential vote aggregation process into the public domain.
The draft Elections (Amendment) Bill, 2026, seeks to introduce hourly livestreaming of voter turnout on election day and public broadcasts of constituency presidential results.
The proponents further seek an open-space national aggregation process that would restrict the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) to verifying and adding up constituency totals.
The initiative comes after the National Assembly dropped proposed amendments to Section 39 of the Elections Act, 2011, leaving the Senate to reconsider the Bill following changes made by MPs.
The coalition argues that Parliament missed an opportunity to address longstanding concerns about the integrity of election results by retaining the existing legal framework.
Its intervention sets up a fresh contest over the rules governing the 2027 elections, particularly the extent to which presidential results should be processed at constituency tallying centres and the role of the national results centre.
Under the proposed amendments, presiding officers would electronically transmit presidential voter-turnout figures every hour to constituency tallying centres, with the information livestreamed through a public portal maintained by the IEBC.
The coalition says the arrangement would make it harder to introduce fictitious voters after polling stations close.
At the polling station, presiding officers would count, tabulate and announce the votes, display the results publicly, transmit the figures electronically and deliver the physical result forms to constituency returning officers.
The proposed law would require constituency returning officers to verify, collate and tally the presidential results received from polling stations before declaring constituency results and publishing the relevant forms on the IEBC’s public portal.
The declarations would be livestreamed, with the results conspicuously displayed at the constituency tallying centres.
At the national level, the coalition wants the IEBC to establish a mechanism for livestreaming presidential results as declared in all 290 constituencies and for the diaspora vote.
The commission would then aggregate the constituency totals in an open public space in Nairobi, rather than relying on a centralised national tallying centre with the ability to alter election figures.
The IEBC chairperson would declare the presidential winner after the aggregation process and verification that the constitutional threshold under Article 138(4) had been met.
The proposal is anchored on the principle that results declared at polling stations should be final and that subsequent tallying centres should collate, rather than revise, the figures.
The coalition says its proposed changes are intended to address historical disputes over the handling of results and strengthen public confidence in elections.
It also wants the government and Parliament to act before the next election, warning that unresolved concerns over electoral transparency could undermine confidence in the outcome.
The coalition plans to introduce the amendment Bill in both the National Assembly and Senate, convene a multi-stakeholder conference within a fortnight and begin nationwide civic education and mobilisation.
It is also pushing for reforms beyond the results process, including the integrity of the voters’ register, election technology, transparent recruitment of election officials and amendments to the Elections Offences Act to tighten the noose on poll officials.
The renewed push follows a long-running legal and political dispute over Section 39 and the interpretation of constitutional provisions governing the declaration of election results.
The coalition maintains that the existing provisions have not adequately resolved concerns about the finality of polling station results and the possibility of interference during the tallying process.
It also cites a September 22, 2026, High Court judgment in the case of Okiya Omtatah v IEBC, which upheld the constitutionality of Section 39 and Regulation 83(2) of the Elections (General) Regulations while leaving Parliament room to amend the law.
The National Assembly, however, has defended its decision to drop the proposed changes, saying MPs were guided by the court's interpretation of the law and the need to retain established procedures for determining and declaring election results.
In a statement explaining its position, the House said reports suggesting that MPs had removed the requirement for livestreaming were false and misleading.
It said the amendments passed by the National Assembly retained the livestreaming requirement under Section 39(1G) and that the decision to delete the Bill's clause on Section 39 was intended to preserve the existing legal framework.
The House said the Bill would now return to the Senate under Article 110(4) of the Constitution, which governs the handling of legislation affecting county governments where the two Houses disagree.
The coalition's proposed model differs from the earlier National Dialogue Committee (NADCO) recommendations, which sought to require electronic transmission of presidential results within two hours of their declaration at polling stations, alongside physical delivery of result forms and publication of polling station forms online.
The NADCO proposals also envisaged tallying and verification at constituency and national levels, with the IEBC chairperson declaring the final presidential results.
INSTANT ANALYSIS
The coalition has framed the dispute as a test of Parliament's willingness to address electoral concerns before the next general election, arguing that reforms should be enacted before campaigns intensify. Its intervention adds pressure on MPs as the Bill returns to the Senate as the competing positions on transparency, the finality of polling station results and the national tallying process shape the next phase of the electoral reform debate.
