The government has been accused of using military presence in the Malindi parliamentary by-election to scare and intimidate voters.
Mombasa Governor Ali Hassan Joho Monday said fundamental abuses took place in the Malindi by-election and demanded that Interior Cabinet Secretary Joseph Nkaissery must address the issues.
Joho said military personnel, complete with armoured personnel carriers were visibly present in Malindi and Nelson Marwa, Coast Regional Coordinator, was in charge of national government security agencies that blockaded the area.
“Fundamental abuses took place in the Malindi by-elections that Nkaissery must address. The Interior Ministry presided over a major scare mongering campaign. It supervised the blockade of Malindi with military personnel on tankers,” he said.
The ODM governor said the Jubilee regime was trying to cover up voter intimidation in Malindi by creating stories about guns in his possession and withdrawing security personnel attached to him.
He said the President and Interior CS owe the country explanations over the presence of military forces during the by-elections.
“A civilian election under a supposedly civilian government being supervised by the military is a massive contradiction. The law is clear about the circumstance under which our military can be deployed. Nkaissery and the Presidency owe the country a good explanation on this breach of the law. The Jubilee government must also come clean on whether it wants to run a civilian regime or it is embracing military rule,” he said.
The mini-polls which were held on March 7 saw ODM retain the seat after its candidate William Mtengo beat Jubilee Alliance Party's Philip Charo.
Mtengo got 15,582 votes to easily trounce Charo, who got 9,243 votes.