IEBC, presidency and police struggling for public trust; TIFA poll
IEBC, presidency and police struggling for public trust; TIFA poll
A new national survey by TIFA Research has painted a troubling picture of public confidence in Kenya’s state institutions, with the presidency, the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) and the National Police Service all struggling to earn the trust of even a third of Kenyans less than a year before the 2027 General Election.
The survey released on Wednesday, September 9, 2026, found that not a single major public institution commands the trust of a majority of Kenyans, underscoring what researchers describe as a growing national confidence deficit amid economic hardship, political polarisation and mounting concerns over governance.
The findings are drawn from TIFA’s June 2026 national survey, based on face-to-face interviews with 2,048 randomly selected adults across all 47 counties conducted between June 13 and June 22, with a margin of error of ±2.18 percentage points.
Respondents were asked how much trust they had in key public institutions and leaders, choosing between “a lot”, “some”, “only a little”, or “none at all”
When TIFA combined those who expressed either “a lot” or “some” trust, every institution scored below 40 percent nationally.
The Judiciary emerged as the country’s most trusted institution at 36 per
cent, followed by county government leadership at 31 per
cent.
The IEBC, Presidency, and Police were tied near the bottom at around 29–30 percent, while Parliament ranked last with 27 percent trust.
The findings mean that for every institution measured, most Kenyans say they have either only a little trust or no trust at all.
TIFA described the results as evidence of a “broad institutional confidence deficit”.
The survey suggests that President William Ruto remains Kenya’s most politically polarising leader, with trust in the presidency varying dramatically depending on political alignment.
Among supporters of the Broad-Based Government (BBG), the political cooperation between Ruto’s UDA and the late Raila Odinga’s ODM, 58 percent said they trusted the president.
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Among BBG opponents, however, that figure dropped to just 16 percent, creating a 42-point gap, the widest partisan divide recorded for any institution in the survey.
The contrast became even sharper when respondents were asked whether they had “a lot” of trust in the president.
While 22 percent of BBG supporters expressed the highest level of confidence in Ruto, only 6 per cent of opponents did.
Yet the survey also found cracks within the president’s broader support base.
Nearly one in five BBG supporters (19 percent) said they had no trust at all in the president, suggesting that scepticism exists even among those aligned with the current political arrangement.
The findings on the IEBC carry particular significance as Kenya prepares for the next general election.
National trust in the electoral commission stood at 30 percent, but political affiliation again made a substantial difference.
Among BBG supporters, 42 percent expressed trust in the commission.
Among opponents, trust fell to 24 percent.
Nearly half of BBG opponents, 47 per cent, said they had no trust at all in the IEBC.
TIFA warned that the commission faces considerable work in rebuilding confidence before the election.
The researchers noted that public trust in the election management body will be critical both during preparations for the vote and in managing acceptance of the eventual outcome.
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