Kenyan Chief Justice David Maraka and colleagues attracted attacks from Uhuru Kenyatta over the cancelled election. Net photo.
KENYA–Tomorrow’s Kenyan Presidential elections hangs in balance after Justice George Odunga ruled that the appointments of electoral agents at the constituency level was illegal.
Odunga stated that the electoral commission did not follow the law when appointing constituency returning officers and their deputies.
In Kenya, the returning officers man the polling centers at the constituency level. They are also responsible for the transmission of results to the national tallying centers.
However, the Electoral Commission announced that the repeat elections will go ahead as planned tomorrow.
Last month the Supreme Court nullified President Uhuru Kenyatta’s August re-election, citing irregularities and illegalities in the vote.
This was the Kenya’s Opposition leader Raila Odinga challenged the results in court, claiming hackers had infiltrated the electoral commission’s computer system and had manipulated the vote. He is currently in boycott campaign of the repeated elections, claiming that the electoral commission has not implemented adequate reforms to guarantee credible elections.
His move has paralyzed the country, with many fearing the face the political crisis, as it happened in 2007-2008.
The court ruling comes at a time when Roselyn Akombe quit as a commissioner of Kenya’s electoral board by issuing a statement from New York.
She said the rerun of the presidential election scheduled for Oct. 26 cannot be free and fair.
“This election as planned cannot meet the basic expectations of a credible election,” said Akombe.
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