Nairobi, Kenya - The race for the Kenyan presidency between Uhuru Kenyatta and main rival Raila Odinga remained tight with about 5 million votes, some 40%of the electorate, already counted.
PANA reports that as at Tuesday, the National Alliance (TNA) candidate, Kenyatta, had widened his lead to 2.6 million votes against Odinga's 2 million solid votes.
But results from most of Odinga's Coalition for Reform and Democracy (CORD) stronghold have mostly not yet declared by Tuesday, PANA reported.
Odinga's running mate, Kalonzo Musyoka, said the party had complained to the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) over delays in the release of the results from their stronghold.
'We have noted the process of releasing the results by IEBC system is slow in some areas close to Nairobi city and we have forwarded our concerns in this regard to them and we hope they would deal with them expeditiously,' Musyoka told a news conference in Nairobi Tuesday.
Musyoka said although Odinga was behind Kenyatta in the polls, results already received showed his votes were spread across the country's vast geographical space and that it confirmed that the party was national.
Musyoka said results should flow over the next few hours to provide 'realistic results' to millions of Kenyans who voted against all difficulties.
According to him, Kenyatta's lead was based on the fact that results from 40% of his support base were already in compared to 10% from Odinga's.
'We are confident that what is being viewed by Kenyans on their screens should change within hours when the results come in,' Musyoka said.
He said Odinga would concede defeat if he lost the election but warned that most results were not yet in.
'We are asking our supporters to be calm. We are just at a third of all the votes cast and we need a little more waiting. We have heard 10,000 more polling stations have sent their results to the IEBC server which would make it two thirds of the vote, at that point, we should be able to see the results,' Musyoka warned.
The IEBC has warned the parties against releasing any results to the public but both CORD and TNA, under the Jubilee Coalition, appeared eager to celebrate their electoral victory in the race.
IEBC Head Ahmed Issack Hassan said he was due to hold talks with the agents of the political parties, including eight Presidential candidates who had sent their information technology experts as agents to the commission.
'We have experienced a network slowdown. We are hoping for a successful completion. The slow pace of transmitting the results are amongst the complaints we have received,' Hassan said.
Pana 06/03/2013