The Supreme Court in Kenya on Monday upheld William Ruto’s election as 5th President of the East African country.
Opposition candidate Raila Odinga had alleged irregularities in the otherwise peaceful August 9 election that was marked by last-minute drama when the electoral commission split and traded accusations of misconduct.
The court found little or no evidence for the various claims and called some “nothing more than hot air.”
The court in the previous election in 2017 overturned the results of the presidential election, a first in Africa, and ordered a fresh vote after Mr. Odinga filed a challenge. He then boycotted that new election.
This time, Mr. Odinga was backed by former rival and outgoing President Uhuru Kenyatta in the latest example of shifting political alliances in East Africa’s most stable democracy.
“This is a unanimous decision. The petitions are hereby dismissed, as a consequence we declare the first respondent (Mr. Ruto) as president-elect,” Chief Justice Martha Koome said.
The court dismissed all nine issues at the heart of the challenge to the results, which had delivered victory to Mr. 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,” Ms. Koome declared.
Source: Lemonde
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