A simple question of what Kenyans chose to expect of and hope for themselves really, for them to answer.
Everyone is tired, no question. Most Kenyans are poor, and the breakdown of the IEBC process caused loss in the economy which hurts poor Kenyans the most. At the same time, the short term value of sweeping another electoral commission fiasco under the rug would be balanced by a huge cost in terms of the dreams of democracy that seemed to have been achieved in the 2002 vote.
The situation regarding the vote is less clear than in 2007, but the meaningful ability to go to court exists this time, unlike in 2007. Should the legal process be shelved now that it is finally available–and if so, will it be available again?
I would be much more enthusiastic about Cord challenging the IEBC rush to anoint the Jubilee Coalition of the Indicted were I not so familiar with the failure of ODM reformers to do anything different from all the politicians I’ve observed since March 1981! The Chief Justice and the constitutionally protected judiciary can genuinely exercise its powers to fairly adjudicate disputes such as whether Jubilee managed to fiddle 5000 or more votes in order to produce a first round win. The big picture long term perspective demands that justice not be sacrificed to illusory and expedient concessions to mobocracy masquerading as democracy; Hitler took power with the will of the majority! And yet the stakes in Kenya are more than whether there was fraud or even error sufficient to set the IEBC presidential decision aside and order a run off. Can Kenyan society survive more weeks and months of extreme uncertainty and rising ethnic and tribal tension?
Unfortunately the US and the international community have managed to alienate a substantial plurality of the Kenyan electorate by waffling while threatening consequences rather than either clearly stating disapproval of a Jubilee win or simply remaining completely silent…