NUMBER OF VOTES RUTO WILL GET IN AUGUST

According to the Star’s study of the official IEBC voter record, the election between Kenya Kwanza leader William Ruto and Azimio leader Raila Odinga may be too close to call.

Maintaining their respective 2017 polling bases would put them nearly even standing at the beginning of the contest in well over half of the counties.

To begin with, Raila would have roughly 8,028,255 votes, while Ruto would have about 7,983,391. This, however, is predicated on the assumption that the Deputy President will win support in Mt. Kenya and the Kalenjin-dominated Rift Valley counties.

At the same time, Raila carries his usual strongholds of Nyanza, Western, Lower Eastern, and Coast. According to the most recent IEBC data, there are a total of 2.2 million voters in the four counties in Western Kenya (2.1 million in Nyanza, 1.6 million in Ukambani, and 1.9 million on the Coast).

They voted for Raila in these areas by large margins in 2017. All ten counties in Mt. Kenya, including Nakuru, voted for the DP, giving them a total of 5,770,976 votes, while the six counties dominated by the Kalenjin cast only 2,212,415 ballots.

Former strongholds of the Jubilee Party, Mt. Kenya, and the Rift Valley were flipped in the last two elections.