The election of Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) grassroots leaders in Sarang’ombe ward on Saturday turned chaotic forcing suspension of the exercise.
Trouble started at Olympic primary school polling station when supporters of various aspirants differed over the method to be used in carrying out the election.
This led to disruption of the initially planned method of secret ballot.
As it stood, most of the aspirants preferred a manual head count rather than secret ballot as was pre-planned by the party’s national election board.
“Voters are opposed to secret ballot as was planned by the head office. People are for the method of queuing behind their preferred aspirant for head count,” said Elisha Wycliffe, an aspirant for the position of youth leader of the ward.
According to Gladys Mogoche who is a registered voter, there are some who don’t have voter’s cards or national identification cards yet they want to vote.
“People have divided opinion on how the voting exercise should be conducted; there are those who want to queue behind their candidate for fear of being locked out of the process because they don’t have the voting cards,” she said.
Olympic primary centre presiding officer Isaiah Omollo was forced to suspend the process after the situation became worse.
The rowdy youth from Olympic then led a procession to Ayany polling centre where they also interrupted the ongoing exercise.
Although there were few reported cases of interference, the election exercise in other wards went on with new grassroots leaders being elected for various positions ranging from chairperson to youth leader.
“Thanks Woodley people for trusting me with your votes by voting me as youth leader earlier today. Secondly, I really appreciate you all for maintaining peace before and after the election. I promise not to let you down,” wrote Kefa Okoyo on his facebook (Amarakaba Maraba) page after winning the election.