President Uhuru Kenyatta. A replica of 2013 voting patterns and voter turnout on August 8 would see Uhuru beat Raila with over 1.2 million votes [mpasho.co.ke].If the voter turnout in all the 47 counties and the voting patterns of 2013 were to replicate in the August 8 polls, President Uhuru Kenyatta would beat Nasa flagbearer Raila Odinga in the first round with over 1.2 million votes.An analysis of the 19.6 million eligible voters published by the Star on Saturday, has put Uhuru at 52.2% way ahead of Raila's 47.7%. That is to say Uhuru would garner 8,568,551 votes against Raila’s 7,334,697.And even if Raila is allocated all the 483,981 votes Nasa co-principal Musalia Mudavadi got in 2013, he would still not get anywhere near victory but would narrow the 1.2 million votes difference with Uhuru to 749,873 votes.The paper, however, notes that a lot has changed since the last General Election, and if the changes are taken into account, they might paint a different picture.For instance, three 2013 presidential candidates who got a combined 129,247 have dropped their bid and support Uhuru for re-election. They are Peter Kenneth, Paul Muite and Martha Karua.Political realignments have also taken place where Nasa appears to have paltry made inroads in Rift Valley and the Meru regions, which voted for Uhuru overwhelmingly in 2013. Other factors such as Jubilee performance might also come into play.In 2013, Uhuru beat then-Cord candidate Raila by 832,887 votes, but narrowly managed to avoid a run-off by just 8,000 votes.This was attributed to a huge voter turnout in the Jubilee strongholds, Central and Rift Valley.On the other hand Cord was hurt by poor turnout in its strongholds of Western, Nyanza and Coast regions.The analysis' projection of the August 8 presidential contest shows both Raila and Uhuru have to push for huge voter turnouts in their strongholds if either is to win.

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