IEBC gives BBI promoters guidelines for collecting signatures

President Uhuru Kenyatta and former Prime Minister Raila Odinga with the BBI documents.

Photo credit: File photo

The electoral agency has issued an approved format for the collection of signatures by the promoters of the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI) Constitution of Kenya (Amendment) Bill 2020, signalling a roadmap to the referendum.

Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) Chairman Mr Wafula Chebukati on Tuesday wrote to the co-chairpersons of the BBI secretariat – Junet Mohammed and Dennis Waweru and enclosed the commission’s approved template for the collection of the at least 1 million signatures.

“To enable the voter verification process and to ensure completeness of the supporters’ records, all the fields in the same approved template should be duly filed as provided,” Mr Chebukati wrote.

It includes the name, national identification card or passport number, county, constituency, ward, polling station, mobile number, email address and signature or thumb print.

Mr Mohammed and Mr Waweru said the Bill will be unveiled on Wednesday at KICC and the four million signature collection exercise kicked off expected to take one week.

Mr Junet said the BBI Bill and forms for signing will be available before being released to the public countrywide.

"Everything is now ready and we are prepared to start the process of collection of signatures," Mr Junet said.

He pointed out that those opposed to the document are free to lead the No campaign.

ODM leader Raila Odinga, whose handshake with President Uhuru Kenyatta on March 9, 2018 birthed the BBI drive, said they were now “good to go.”

Mr Odinga said that they will now move on adding that even if additional time was added till next year or the year after, there will still be those with more views to be incorporated.

“There are those people who talk of the right time. There will never be any right time. Things will be happening.”

“Today it is Covid, tomorrow it will be famine, drought, locust invasion or lamina and so on and so forth,” he said, adding that the 'Kenya express'  train had already left the station.