With less than 50 days to the August 9 elections, Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) has gazetted the voter register.
The register indicates that 22,102,532 voters will have the opportunity of voting for William Ruto of the United Democratic Alliance or Raila Odinga of the Azimio la Umoja-One Kenya coalition party as the 5th president of Kenya.
The publication of the register now sets the stage for serious vote hunting, especially in areas considered battlegrounds.
However, an analysis of the registered voters gives the Kenya Kwanza supremo an upper hand in the quest to occupy the house on the hill.
According to political analysts, DP Ruto has to retain the votes garnered by President Uhuru Kenyatta in 2017 for him to have any chance of succeeding his miss.
But as the August election first approaches, the former Eldoret North MP has not only tried to ring-fence President Uhuru’s vote basket, he has also eaten a large junk of the ODM leader’s strongholds.
Ruto has slowly turned Western Kenya which boosts 2,217,948 registered voters into a battleground thanks to the support of Amani National Congress leader Musalia Mudavadi and Ford Kenya leader Moses Wetangu’la.
For instance, recent opinion polls show that DP Ruto is more popular than the former prime minister in Bungoma County which has 646,598.
In Kakamega County with 844,557 registered votes, the second in command is trailing the ODM leader but not with a bigger margin.
The fact that Mudavadi and Wetang’ula have a target of delivering 70% of Mulembe votes is working to Ruto’s advantage.
The former prime minister has slowly lost grip of the coastal region as the key of his former brigades shifted their loyalty to the DP.
Kilifi, Kwale, Tana River, and Lamu counties with a combined 1,140,004 have slowly shown the desire to vote for Ruto.
A recent poll by Tifa Research indicated that the ODM leader’s popularity is below 50% which is worrying for the Azimio la Umoja Umoja-One Kenya coalition party presidential flag bearer.
In the Mt Kenya region, which controls 4,716,720 votes, Raila has failed to dethrone the UDA leader even with the backing of President Uhuru as opinion polls have placed his popularity below 25%.
From the analysis, Ruto stands to garner a considerable number of votes in Western, Coastal, and Maasai land which traditionally has voted for Raila Odinga.
