Kenyan Elections: Cleaning Toilets, Wheelbarrows and School Houses
Kenya is in the final week of preparation for the upcoming presidential, parliamentary and local elections, which are due to take place next week Tuesday, 9 August.
Kenya’s Minister of Education, George Magoha, raised eyebrows when he unexpectedly began school holidays four days early on Tuesday, 2 August, leaving parents scrambling to collect their children, as the venues will be used as voting stations.
Local politicians are leaving no stone unturned, with some going so far as to scrub toilets for a photo opportunity.
Polycarp Igathe – one of the candidates running to be Governor of Nairobi – has been spotted over the past two months washing cars, selling chapatis on street corners, tending a bar and mopping the public toilets in the Capitol.
Tweeps have responded with humour, as one user joked: “Nairobians, be aware that there is someone called Polycarp Igathe, he can easily enter your house as early as 5 am to prepare breakfast and even wash the dishes.
“He is accompanied by ten cameras and security. Don’t confuse them with BURGLARS [sic].”
Other candidates are also resorting to unusual tactics to encourage Kenyans to vote. Johnson Sakaja, Igathe’s main competition for the role, has gone so far as to climb into a wheelbarrow placed on top of his car in an attempt to appeal to the entrepreneurial youth.
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