Digital strategist Dennis Itumbi has filed a responding affidavit at the Supreme Court in the presidential election petition challenging the results which declared William Ruto as president-elect.
In his eight-page affidavit, Itumbi, who runs what he refers to the ‘Hustler Nation Intelligence Bureau’ for Kenya Kwanza, dismissed a Tuesday affidavit filed by John Githongo which put him and ten others at the centre of an alleged election rigging plot.
Githongo claimed that Itumbi was one of ten supervisors, in charge of a 56-man team, that allegedly, from the Hustler Plaza in Karen, edited Form 34As which had been electronically transmitted through the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) portal before re-uploading manipulated versions of the said forms.
The corruption whistleblower specifically singled out Itumbi and five other individuals; Davis Chirchir, Kibyegon, Morris Mutegi, Baby Serge and Jackson Kandi as the masterminds behind the alleged rigging plot.
He also claimed to have been approached by one of the individuals who allegedly took part in the vote rigging exercise, although he did not mention a name in his affidavit.
Despite ceding that Kenya Kwanza had a parallel tallying centre to keep track of the results being tabulated by IEBC, Itumbi in his affidavit labeled Githongo’s claims as purely fictional.
“I have been shown an Affidavit by Githongo thatalleges that he met with an unnamed whistleblower, who purports to have revealed details of his involvement with a ‘large scale, well-orchestrated fraudulent scheme that enabled them to interfere with and compromise the IEBC electoral data transmission system and manipulate the presidential election results’ in favor of DP Ruto,” said Itumbi in the affidavit seen by Citizen Digital.
“Githongo’s narration and whistle-blower account is a fantasy and fictional story with shadowy imaginary characters and locations.”
While distancing himself from the aforementioned five individuals, Itumbi went on to clarify that neither himself nor his team were involved in accessing, entering or manipulating the IEBC entries.
“There was no such tallying system which received data or images from the KIEMS kits, manipulated it and then uploaded it to the IEBC system,” said Itumbi.
“I do not know any of these individuals other than Davis Chirchir. While I do know him from various interactions over the years, he and I did not work together in any capacity on issues of tallying during this election period.”
Itumbi went on to explain why Kenya Kwanza set up its 24-hour parallel tallying centre for the August 9 polls.
“Setting up and developing this tallying center was a product of real time tests and lessons learned over time,” said Itumbi..
“These initiatives were not new for the general election. Rather, we started testing and developing the concept during the by elections held in the last year: from Msambweni in Kwale, Juja in Kiambu, Bonchari in Kisii. Kiambaa in Kiambu, and Kabuchai in Bungoma and Matungu in Kakamega.”
He correspondingly detailed how Kenya Kwanza implemented the parallel-tallying centre concept during the polls.
According to Itumbi, Kenya Kwanza deployed over 46,000 polling station agents and 4,600 managers responsible for 10 polling stations, who then reported to 290 ‘mashinani’ hustler nation coordinators.
“The coalition further engaged 4,600 boda bodas to transport the managers to collect the hard copy Form 34As from their polling stations, immediately they were signed by the Presiding Officers,” said Itumbi.
“These forms were eventually brought to the UDA Party Headquarters — Hustler’s Plaza on Ngong Road. The forms were used to compare with the results being verified and announced at Bomas.”
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