Some members of the immediate former Football Kenya Federation (FKF) Electoral Board have revealed that they faced threats and intimidation in the build up to the last elections that gifted Nick Mwendwa a second term.
Kentice Tikolo the chair of the board disclosed that she came face to face with hooliganism while another board member claimed that some football officials went to the point of drawing guns on them during the emotive elections that dragged on for over a year due to myriad of court cases.
But despite the challenges, Kentice entered the annals of football history as the first woman to have successfully conducted a violence-free football election in Kenya.
Mwendwa easily retained his seat after a couple of candidates like Samson Nyamweya, Sam Sholei and Nicholas Musonye among others withdrew from the race for various reasons.
Kentice revealed that she had to fight football hooliganism and intimidation during an emotive election in the boardroom and on the corridors of justice.
In her first candid interview about the experience as the Board chair, Kentice revealed that she faced threats and intimidation from the high and mighty to try and influence her stand. But she stood firm.
“To me, it is not a big deal, really. It is the media that makes me feel big when they say that I conducted an election without violence. Why should there be violence. We were very transparent,” she responded when asked how she feels about being the first woman with such an accomplishment.
A goon picked ballot papers
Kentice also said that there were attempts to interfere with the ballot boxes, but the security features that were in the ballot papers saved the day after a delegate attempted to print new polling papers.
“In Kisumu, for example, one of the candidates tried to be funny. He sent his goon who picked the ballot paper around 11am in the morning and just sat there. He suddenly walked out with his ballot papers.
“But a few minutes before the polling station closed, we realized that we still had one voter holding the ballot papers. Eventually he comes and guess what they do, they create commotion, then grab the ballot boxes and throw them out in an attempt to stuff more papers in the boxes.
“But luckily, we had security features in our ballot papers and they were serialized so they had no option but to concede because when we were counting, we had to check on the security features.”
After the deadline
On intimidation, she added: “A delegate came after the deadline and told me that he’s been sent by a former Attorney General. I picked my phone and called the (ex) AG and told him that the guy has come after the deadline, but because of the respect I have for him, I promised to look into the matter.
“Funny enough, the complainant also wanted me to talk to some alleged branch officials, but when I called the numbers he had provided, nobody picked. Some lady later called back but she was equally surprised by what I was talking about because she was not even aware of any football elections. Right away I realized that the guy had no case.
“So I reported back to the AG telling him that your constituent has nothing to stand on and he respected my decision,” revealed Kentice who believes that the elections were conducted without any iota of violence due to the high level of transparency.
The election was punctuated by a myriad of court cases but Kentice and her board members took advantage of the slow legal process to plan for their next move.
“I never thought of throwing the towel because for me, the court cases were giving us time to plan on how to put things right,” she said.