The Supreme Court of Kenya, ruled on September 5, 2022 that the postponement of gubernatorial elections in the counties of Mombasa and Kakamega by the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commissioner (IEBC) did not affect the presidential election outcome.
Chief Justice Martha Koome, while delivering the verdict on behalf of the seven-judge-bench, stated that IEBC did not act in bad in faith, in postponing the elections in certain areas.
“We’ve looked at the provisions of Section 55b of the Elections Act which provides for circumstances when elections can be postponed in a particular electorate unit including in cases of emergency.
"We are therefore satisfied that on the basis of foregoing the provision, the second respondent had the requisite power to postpone elections.
“There may be other factors to which the low turnout can be attributed. If there was a low voter turnout it affected all the candidates. Therefore voter suppression has nothing to do with the question under review,” stated Chief Justice Koome.
IEBC commissioner Irene Masit had argued that chairperson Wafula Chebukati delayed the elections in the two counties with the aim of influencing the final presidential results.
In her affidavit, Masit accused Chebukati of making the decision without involving all the commissioners.
“Immediately after the declaration of the contested presidential election results, the chairperson in furtherance of his unilateral and unconstitutional decisions proceeded to release a press statement individually and indefinitely postponing elections in the areas that had been gazetted to carry out by-elections on 23rd of August, 2022,”
“The indefinite postponement of elections was a unilateral decision of the chairperson of the commission in furtherance of his misconstruction of the roles and mandate of the chairperson of IEBC as is by law established.” read Masit’s affidavit.
IEBC denied the allegations, maintaining that it called off the elections following a mix-up of ballot papers.
Kakamega and Mombasa counties were perceived to be the former Prime Minister’s strongholds. The Azimio La Umoja One-Kenya coalition gubernatorial candidates Fernandes Barasa and Abdulswamad Nassir won the delayed elections.
Elections were also postponed in Kitui Rural, Kacheliba, West Pokot, and Rongai constituencies as well as Nyaki West and Kwa Njenga electoral wards.
The judgment further read: Concerning the aggregation of voter suppression, we know that voter suppression is generally recognized as a political strategy which takes many forms but whose practical effect is ultimately to reduce voting by discouraging or preventing targeted groups of people from exercising their right to vote.
It therefore goes against the spirit of equality which guarantees every citizen the right to make political choices based on universal suffrage.
From the explanation we are satisfied that the postponement was occasioned by a genuine mistake which in our view could have been avoided and the members and staff of IEBC could have been more diligent when they went to inspect the templates in Athens, Greece, where the printing of ballot papers was undertaken.
Being an individual consideration and influence, there may be other factors to which the turn out in the named units can be attributed from the evidence on record. However it appears to us that the 2022 general election recorded one of the lowest turnouts since the introduction of multi-party political systems 30 years ago.
In our view, there was no nexus between the mint of elections and voter turnout in the affected units, far from the fact that this was undoubtedly just another red herring.
It has nothing to do with the question under review and accordingly we rejected and hold that there is no proof that the postponement resulted in voter suppression to the detriment of the first petitioner."
Ruto garnered 7,176,141 votes (50.49% of the total votes) to defeat his closest rival Raila Odinga who got 6,942,930 votes (48.88% of the total votes).
