It is now official that the Malava United Democratic Alliance (UDA) flag bearer will be known on Saturday 20.

The exercise will be digitally conducted.

Already the party organs are meeting the four hopefuls to brief and train them on how the exercise will be conducted besides demystifying any queries in relation to the process.

While addressing the Media on September 16, UDA election board members led by Jimmy Kahindi stated that only party members captured in the IEBC register will be allowed to vote for their respective candidates.

“We have been mandated by the UDA national office to move with haste and take the aspirants through the voting process after which they will pass the technical knowhow to their agents who will in turn be able to direct their voters at the polling centers to cast their votes via a digital platform,” he said.

The exercise, he assured was a more simplified than the electronic and manual ones and did not need more directives for one to vote.

He said efforts for the aspirants to have a consensus had hit a brick wall and that UDA being a democratic party was giving each candidate equal opportunity.

Confirming whether the gadgets were compliant, Kahindi told the Media that the UDA ICT team will be on standby to handle any hitches and also added that while the process will be fully digital it was an offline exercise that was likely not to halt.

Unlike to the expectations of many aspirants to be given a direct UDA ticket the party was unable to single out and asked them to agree of which they were unable leading to the digital voting as the last option. 

And as the event was underway a group of elders drawn from Malava were visibly present with their main agenda being to talk to the four aspirants to settle on one of them.

However according to the UDA officials including Kakamega county administrator Desmond Shinaka, the party had already settled on nominations as the free and fair way of letting the voters elect their preferred candidate.

Just days earlier, during an empowerment programme for PWDs, the hopefuls promised to support one of their own as a flag bearer after the nomination exercise.

The meeting which was led by presidential William Ruto’s aide Farouk Kibet and Speaker of the National Assembly Moses Wetang’ula.

 The hopefuls include Simon Kangwana, Leonard Shimaka, Rhyan Injendi and David Ndakwa.