'Vote bribers' caught in Kenya

2002-12-27 15:34

Mombasa, Kenya - Police in the Kenyan port city of Mombasa arrested two people on Friday for paying voters in landmark polls 100 shillings (US$1.25) to vote for the ruling party, an election official told reporters.

"Some people tried to bribe voters outside our polling station and we took quick action and had them arrested immediately," said the presiding officer at Bomu Primary School, who gave his name only as Musumba.

Earlier, police tried to disperse hundreds of people queueing outside a house opposite the polling station, in which a representative of the Kenya African National Union (Kanu), in power since 1963, was handing out 100 shilling notes in return for votes, according to one man who came out of the house.

The man, who asked not to be named, said he had taken the money but had no intention of voting Kanu.

Hardly anyone was lining up outside the polling station itself.

In Nairobi, Raila Odinga, a leading figure in the National Rainbow Coalition (NARC), Kanu's main rival in the polls, said there had been several reports of vote-buying across the country.

"There are areas where agents, particularly of Kanu, have distributed money openly in queues," he said.

NARC handed out a long list of alleged voting irregularities in all of Kenya's eight province.

"Vote buying" was reported in Emgwem constituency in the Rift Valley.

The document accused an official of the FORD-People party of "dishing out money" in Webuye in Western Kenya.

NARC reported similar incidents in Nyanza, Rift Valley, Eastern and Western provinces. - Sapa-AFP

- SAPA