Seven other petitioners challenge Ruto win

President-elect William Ruto (left) and his deputy Rigathi Gachagua at the Bomas of Kenya on August 15, 2022. [Jonah Onyango, Standard]

Seven petitioners have filed separate cases challenging the declaration of Deputy President William Ruto as the winner of the presidential election.

The petitioners include human rights activists, politicians and voters who claim the election was marred with irregularities.

Human rights activists Khelef Khalifa, George Osewe, Ruth Mumbi and Grace Kamau filed one of the petitions through lawyer Willies Otieno.

They claimed the poll was mismanaged to the extent you could not tell the winner between Dr Ruto and Azimio candidate Raila Odinga.

"The massive, systematic and deliberate non-compliance with the Constitution went to the core and heart of the election and as a result, we had an outcome which does not reflect the will of the people," said Otieno.

The activists have raised 15 issues which they claim affected the integrity of the presidential election, and that Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission Chairman Wafula Chebukati acted with impunity in bungling what would have turned out to be the most successful election.

John Njoroge Kamau, a voter, argued that Chebukati committed an electoral offence by failing to ensure that the presidential results were correctly tallied and verified to reflect the people's will.

According to Kamau, IEBC deliberately set out to bungle the presidential election from the time it issued the tender for printing ballot papers which resulted in mix-up of voting materials in certain areas.

"What we are asking the court is to declare that the presidential election was not conducted in accordance with the Constitution which rendered any declaration of results invalid, null and void," said Njoroge.

Activist and Busia Senator-elect Okiya Omtatah filed the other suit alongside Wyclife Nyakina, Victor Okuna and John Maina. They argued that Mr Chebukati had no legal authority to tally, verify and declare results in the absence of four commissioners who disowned his final tally.

According to the group, there were also discrepancies in the voter turnout and that this was deliberately done to increase votes garnered by Dr Ruto while reducing the votes cast in favour of Raila.

"A correct tabulation of the voter turnout announced by the chairman showed that he cannot account for 140,138 votes. If this is correctly put in the final tally, it shows that Ruto did not win the election and was irregularly declared as the winner," said Omtatah.

Gospel musician turned politician Reuben Kigame who was denied clearance by IEBC to contest the presidency also filed a petition challenging Dr Ruto's win on account that all the four presidential candidates were illegally nominated to contest.

Kigame's contentions are that the commission illegally locked him out despite a court order that they consider his candidature, and that any resultant outcome of the process should be declared null and void.

Youth Advocacy Africa and Peter Kirika raised the issue of voter register, electronic identification of voters, integrity of the technology employed by IEBC in the conduct of the elections and the procedure used in tallying the presidential election as some of the issues that affected the results.

"We have taken a sample of 12 counties which shows that a total of 340,803 people voted for the president only and did not vote for other seats. This is a clear discrepancy which shows the results are invalid, null and void," they said through lawyer Njoki Mboche.

The other petition was filed by Juliah Nyokabi, Joseph Mutua and Simon Njenga through lawyer Kibe Mungai who argued that failure by IEBC to provide arrangements for special category of citizens to vote compromised the integrity of the electoral process.

Mungai claimed that millions of voters could not participate in the election due to the poor system put in place by the commission which made them take advantage to announce results which do not reflect the will of the people.

The seventh petition was filed by Daniel Ngari. He raised issues similar to the other petitioners.

Although all the eight petitions, including the one filed by the Azimio team, are challenging the election of Ruto, outgoing Gatundu South MP Moses Kuria filed a different petition to block Raila and Martha Karua from being given audience at the Supreme Court.

Kuria claimed that the Azimio leader, through his agents, caused chaos at the Bomas of Kenya during the declaration of results and should not get the orders he is seeking from the apex court.