Nairobi — The Supreme Court has dismissed a petition challenging the election of Wajir Governor Ahmed Abdullahi and his deputy, Ahmed Muhumed Abdi.
The petition had been filed by Governor Abdullahi's rival Dr. Hassan Mohamed Adam.
The Supreme Court's decision aligns with the earlier ruling by the Court of Appeal, which had also struck out a similar petition on the grounds that it violated Rule 6 of The Court of Appeal (Election Petition) Rules, 2017, which requires all appeals to be initiated through a notice of appeal.
On Friday, Supreme Court Judges Martha Koome, Philemona Mwilu, Njoki Ndungu, Isaac Lenaola, and William Ouko upheld the Court of Appeal's decision.
Appellate Judges Daniel Musinga, Hellen Omondi, and Ngenye Macharia had initially dismissed the appeal filed by Hassan Mohamed Adam, citing a lack of a proper notice of appeal.
Dissatisfied with the appellate court decision, Dr. Adam through his lawyers Kioko Kilukumi, Paul Nyamodi, and Issa Mansur sought recourse at the Supreme Court, which holds jurisdiction over appeals lodged under Article 163(4) (a) of the Constitution.
Article 163(4) (a) allows appeals to the Supreme Court as a matter of right in cases involving the interpretation or application of the Constitution.
"Having considered the appeal, the notice of motion and the parties' respective submissions thereto, as advanced by their respective advocates on record, we find no justifiable reasons to interfere with the Ruling of the Court of Appeal," reads part of the ruling.
The ruling further states, "Accordingly, the appellant's appeal is hereby struck out with costs to the respondents."
Dr, Adam's journey to the Supreme Court began after a three-judge bench at the Appellate court dismissed his petition on the grounds of violating Rule six of the Court of Appeal (Election Petition) Rules
Adam then moved to the Supreme Court after a three judge bench sitting at the Appellate court dismissed his petition for offending rule six of the court of appeal (Election Petition) rules 2017, which requires that all appeals be initiated by way of a notice.
Earlier in the year, Adam had suffered a major blow after the High Court upheld the election of Governor Abdullahi.
The petitioner had alleged several illegalities and irregularities in the conduct of the elections, which included intimidation and misinformation of voters, gross discrepancies in the statutory forms, improper tallying and tabulation of results, failure to deploy KIEMS kits and inflation of vote numbers through the use of supervisor method of voter identification.
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The Governor and IEBC denied all the allegations as was set out in the petition, maintaining that the elections were backed by an elaborate electoral management system in compliance with various electoral laws, which system included several layers of safeguards to ensure an open, transparent, participatory and accountable system to guarantee free and fair elections pursuant to the Constitution.
Upon hearing the petition, the trial court dismissed the petition with costs; and upheld the election of Abdullahi and Ahmed Muhumed Abdi as Governor and Deputy Governor respectively.
Aggrieved by that outcome, Adam filed the appeal on grounds that the gubernatorial elections were not conducted in accordance with the Constitution, or the requisite election laws and regulations, as there were several breaches of the law, which fatally affected the integrity of the election, and the trial court was in error in its findings.
