Access to information will be paramount for voters to make an educated choice at the March 4th General Election. This includes the latest news, knowledge about the location of polling stations, information about registration and an overview of the candidates running for office. Here are some interesting websites that contribute unique insight on some of the relevant people and issues. IEBC www.iebc.co.ke With talk of results being announced electronically, the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission website has to be the first port of call on the Internet for all things election.

The site, whose slogan is “your vote, your future”, is where users can confirm voter registration as well as find news on activities planned around the next phases of the election process. Users can find downloads such as “Qualifications and Requirements for Nomination of Candidates for Different Elective Positions”. The site does have a few dead links, which we hope will be rectified as soon as possible. Kenya Elections Hub www.google.com/elections/ed/ke Launched by Google this January, the site aggregates content—both articles and videos—from local and international news outlets.

It also includes blogs and Twitter hashtags into a singular portal for ease of use by interested parties. The site is accessible in both English and Kiswahili. A “trends” tab helps users find out how a candidate fairs (by day, week and month) based on mentions across Google’s various platforms. Google’s Policy Manager for Sub- Saharan Africa, Ory Okolloh acknowledges that “this will be one of the most watched elections in the world”, which is why the company has chosen to focus on filtering content about Kenyan politics. She says, “It is important that we tell our story during this election.”

Similar platforms have been used in Brazil, Czech Republic, Egypt, France, Mexico, Netherlands, USA and more recently in Senegal and Ghana. Mzalendo www.mzalendo.com This non-partisan project takes its name from the Swahili word for “Patriot”. Its role is that of a watchdog, keeping an eye on the activities of the National Assembly, MPs, and aspirants ahead of the 2013 elections. An interesting aspect on the site is the MPs “score card”. This offers an assessment of the performance of all 222 MPs in the 10th Parliament.

This is done by measuring how easily the leaders can be contacted, their appearances in Hansard (searchable transcript from parliament) and Constituencies Development Fund (CDF) spending performance—a service further simplified for users through the provision of an interactive map of Kenya. It also provides pertinent information on the roles of newly elected representatives namely; President, Senator, Member of Parliament, Women Representative, Governor and County Representative.

My Aspirant myaspirantmyleader.com This is an interesting addition to the list seeing that it is a commercially-driven election site that is still handy to the mwananchi. Describing itself as a platform that enables aspirants/politicians to share their agendas, profiles and manifestos and also organize campaigns in an efficient way. Of note, the search facility on the site enables users to locate aspirants from all counties in all six categories. The site also offers services such as “bulk SMS”.