Prime
Raila files election petition
Mr Raila Odinga (C) addresses journalists in Nairobi after Uhuru Kenyatta was declared President. He said there were massive irregularities in the final election tally. PHOTO by AFP
What you need to know:
Cord’s lead lawyer George Oraro said the coalition has enough evidence to prove its case at the Supreme Court.
The Coalition for Reforms and Democracy (Cord) has said it is confident of overturning the election of Uhuru Kenyatta after filing a petition, contesting his declaration as the president-elect.
Cord’s lead lawyer George Oraro said the coalition has enough evidence to prove its case at the Supreme Court.
“We (Cord) have a strong case and are sure we are going to overturn Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) move to declare Uhuru Kenyatta as president-elect,” Mr Oraro said yesterday.
He said the IEBC had not provided all the information Cord needed but it had “sufficient evidence” to mount a strong case.
Mr Oraro said Prime Minister Raila Odinga is the petitioner in the case.
He named the respondents as IEBC, commission chairman Isaack Hassan, Mr Kenyatta and deputy-president elect William Ruto. Mr Hassan is the returning officer of the presidential results.
Mr Oraro said Cord has assembled five lawyers to argue its case before the Supreme Court. He said Cord was dissatisfied with the way vote counting was done and that party agents did not sign Form 36.
After court officials verified Cord’s documents, the legal team was asked to deposit Ksh1 million (about Shs30.8m) as security and Ksh550,000 (about Shs17m) for advertisement in local media.
Civil society group, AFRICOG, also filed a petition challenging the tallying process at the Bomas of Kenya.
Mr Odinga accuses IEBC of negligence and failure to conduct free and fair elections in the March 4 elections.
Addressing a press conference yesterday, the prime minister, said they have enough evidence to challenge IEBC results.
“I am not challenging the outcome of the IEBC results because I want to be declared president but rather let the will of the people prevail. We are going to court today. We have enough evidence,” Mr Odinga said.
Mr Odinga led the Cord team to the Supreme Court to file the petition.
Before moving to court, Mr Odinga held a media briefing at his office at 10am where he highlighted why the case is important.
On Friday, one of Cord’s lawyer, Mr James Orengo, said the civil society had filed many applications in court and the coalition had decided to file its challenge on Saturday.
He said the move would allow Kenyans understand the petition merits and why Cord was disputing the results announced by IEBC.
“We have been informed that several other cases were being filed today (Friday) at the Supreme Court mostly by civil society. That is why we have pushed ours to Saturday so that the public could get a chance to follow it without it being lumped with other petitions, which were being filed today (Friday),” he said during a news conference at the Serena Hotel, Nairobi.
