Nairobi — Nine presidential petitions were lodged at the Supreme Court on Monday with eight of them seeking to overturn President-Elect William Ruto’s victory.
Ruto was declared the winner of the August 9 general election after sailing past the ’50 per cent plus one’ constitutional threshold that requires a winner in a presidential election to garner 50 per cent of votes cast and an additional vote to avoid a runoff.
The United Democratic Alliance (UDA) candidate garnered 7,176,141 (50.49 per cent) votes beating his closest challenger, Azimio’s Raila Odinga, who managed 6,942,930 votes (48.85 percent).
Ruto’s victory has however, been challenged at the Apex Court by Odinga and eight other petitioners who want the election nullified and a fresh election conducted in accordance with the law and Electoral Act.
Apart from Odinga, other petitioners include John Njoroge Kamau, Daniel Kariuki Ngari, Juliah Nyokabi, Khalef Khalifa, Okiya Omtatah, Youth Advocacy Africa and Reuben Kigame.
Kigame, a gospel musician cum politician was also in the race to succeed President Uhuru Kenyatta before the electoral body locked him out of the race.
He argued that IEBC put in place unreasonable deadlines for presidential aspirants in order to be cleared to run, thereby locking out some aspirants.
On the other hand, Chama Cha Kazi Party leader Moses Kuria also moved to the Supreme Court to dismiss Azimio La Umoja One Kenya Coalition Presidential Candidate Raila Odinga ‘s petition seeking to nullify President-elect William Ruto’s win.
In his suit papers, the former Gatundu South MP cited the violence that was witnessed during last Monday’s declaration at the Bomas of Kenya as his main reason.
He wants Odinga to take responsibility for the violence and his petition dismissed.
In Odinga’s petition, the Azimio coalition wants both a re-run and a re-tallying of the August 9th Presidential Election.
The petition largely placed the Chairperson of the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) Wafula Chebukati at the centre of the dispute.
The Azimio petition indicates that Chebukati failed to tally around 140,000 votes.
As a result, Ruto “did not meet the constitutional threshold of 50% plus 1 of the valid votes cast” – a requirement for him to be declared the winner.
The seven-judge-bench led by Chief Justice Martha Koome will now hear and determine the petitions within 14 days and issue their verdict.