Nairobi — The Supreme Court is set to issue its judgment on the appeal case on the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI) on Thursday, March 31.
Supreme Court Registrar Letizia Wachira said the seven-judge bench chaired by Chief Justice Martha Koome will issue the verdict at 9.00am.
In the much-anticipated ruling that may have major consequences for the August 9 presidential and parliamentary polls, the court will either appeal the ruling of the Court of Appeal that rendered the BBI process unconstitutional, null and void or invalidate the lower court’s ruling all together.
President Uhuru Kenyatta and former Prime Minister Raila Odinga who engineered the BBI process were among those who moved to the apex court to challenge the invalidation of the process and will be looking out for a different outcome.
The constitutional reforms pushed by the two aimed to expand the executive and address the “winner-takes-all electoral system” blamed for frequent explosions of poll-related violence.
The BBI was drawn up following a rapprochement between President Kenyatta and his erstwhile opponent Odinga and a famous handshake between the two after the ODM leader disputed the outcome of the 2017 election.
The proposed amendments to the 2010 constitution were approved by parliament in May 2021 and were then due to be put to a referendum.
But just two days later, a three-judge bench of the High Court ruled they were illegal as the president did not have the right to initiate the process.
The Court of Appeal in August 2021 upheld that view and said President Kenyatta could even be sued in a civil court for launching the process.
At the Supreme Court during the hearing, President Kenyatta’s lawyers mounted a spirited fight submitting that the law gives the president immunity from prosecution or civil action while he is in office.
“It is necessary that the president has decisional freedom, to make decisions that are key and important to safeguard the interest of the country,” the lawyers argued.