NAIROBI, March 7 (Xinhua) -- Kenya's electoral body on Thursday denied that the results for the Monday's general elections are being doctored at the national tallying centre in Nairobi, maintaining that the commission is an impartial arbiter in the polls.
Addressing a news conference in Nairobi, the Independent Electoral and Boundary Commission (IEBC) chairman Isaack Hassan also dismissed reports that the electronic vote system which was being used to relay results was hacked.
"The electronic vote transmission was faulty and we had to revert to manual system but I want to stress here that the system was not hacked into as its being alleged," Hassan told journalists in Nairobi.
"The results we are releasing are the true verified results that are validated by all involved officers. The Returning Officers are verifying the results they validated at the County and constituency tallying centres," he said.
The IEBC's chairman's denial comes after accusations by one of the main presidential contender, Prime Minister Raila Odinga's running mate, Kalonzo Musyoka alleged vote-rigging and demanded that the count be halted, sparking an outcry from his supporters across the country.
"We have evidence that the results we have received have been doctored..total votes cast exceed the actual number of registered voters," said Musyoka who is from the Coalition for Reform and Democracy (CORD)' which is led by Odinga.
"Because of these concerns, we as a coalition take the position that the national vote tallying process lacks integrity and has to be stopped and restarted using primary documents from the polling station," Musyoka told a news conference in Nairobi.
Musyoka however appealed for calm, tolerance and peace among Kenyans as they pursue various options including moving to vote.
"We have called to express seriously reservations about the election exercise and in particular, the tallying process going on at the Bomas of Kenya," Musyoka told journalists in Nairobi.
But the IEBC chairman said he cannot stop the ongoing tallying of the ballot since it was a legal process and told the aggrieved parties to seek legal redress to stop it. "We cannot stop tallying of votes, as this is a legal process.
Objections should follow due process of the law. The IEBC is committed to respecting the oath of office," he said.
He said any election malpractice by any official leads to the official bearing personal responsibility.
Many people have raised concerns at the widespread failure of a system under which the electoral commission had been broadcasting running tallies based on encrypted text messages received from polling stations.
Odinga and his main rival, Uhuru Kenyatta have urged calm after hitches caused an electronic tallying system to stall, forcing the IEBC on Wednesday to start reading out results delivered in person by returning officers. "This is not a call for mass action but we are exploring other options including going to court," Musyoka told journalists in Nairobi.
The 2007 violence caused by the disputed results that triggered weeks of deadly ethnically motivated violence which left 1,200 people dead was sparked by hitches during the tallying process. Hassan had initially said that the results would be relayed 48 hours after Monday's vote but following several hitches, the commission has kept postponing the release.
IEBC said it is allowed by law up to 7 days after the close of polling, meaning next Monday, to announce the results. The anxiety over the presidential results has affected several businesses in most of urban centres which remained closed, affecting several public transport operators in various parts of the East African nation.
Millions of Kenyans have chosen to stay indoors to monitor results on television sets. Most Kenyans have suspended all their normal activities until the final tally of the presidential results are announced.
Kenya's constitution, which was enacted in 2010, provides for the election of a president, governor, senator, Member of Parliament, women's representative and ward representative, all in one day.
Several observer missions which monitored the largely peaceful general elections have called on Kenyans to remain calm.
