Kenya’s Supreme Court Upholds Ruto Victory In Presidential Election

The Supreme Court in Kenya, on Monday, upheld the electoral victory of William Ruto in the August 9 presidential election.

William Ruto Wins At Supreme Court

The apex court ruling now puts to an end, weeks of political uncertainty as well as ending opposition leader, Raila Odinga’s allegation that the poll was marred with electoral fraud.

“This is a unanimous decision. The petitions are hereby dismissed, as a consequence we declare the first respondent (Ruto) as president-elect,” Chief Justice Martha Koome said.

The supreme court dismissed all nine issues at the heart of the challenge to the results, which had delivered victory to Ruto by a margin of less than two percentage points.

“The… irregularities were not of such magnitude as to affect the final results of the presidential election,” Koome declared.

Ruto was declared winner of the ballot on August 15, by the head of the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC), Wafula Chebukati, with 50.4 percent against Odinga’s 48.8 percent.

However, just before the announcement of the results, four of the seven commissioners disowned the result.

But Koome said that “apart from their eleventh-hour denunciation of the verification process …the four commissioners have not shown any evidence that the election was compromised”.

Justice Koome also said the court found no evidence that the results had been tampered via hacking of the IEBC servers, as was alleged by Odinga’s camp.

Ruto, the 55-year-old incumbent deputy president, is now due to take office on September 13.

Both the Ruto and Odinga camps had pledged to accept the court’s ruling.

The president-elect was elected in 2013 and 2017 alongside current president, Uhuru Kenyatta.

Meanwhile, Kanyi Daily had reported that the Nigeria’s presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP), Peter Obi congratulated Ruto on winning the presidential election in the East African country.

Obi added that it is indeed victory for democracy and the people of Kenya.