The Supreme Court judges moments before they delivered the 2017 ruling on the presidential petition. (courtesy)
NAIROBI—The Supreme Court will tomorrow, the 15th of February, deliver the second most awaited election challenge after the 2017 presidential petition.
The Maraga led Court will determine a gubernatorial petition challenging the victory of Governor Mohamed Abdi of Wajir in landmark ruling that will see if the courts can try pre-election disputes, a role charged with the electoral commission.
The Friday verdict is last of several gubernatorial petitions whose appeal were upheld.
However, the Wajir petition is different because it’s conspicuously dealing with the credibility of a university degree, a prerequisite for a gubernatorial candidate.
“If the petition is upheld, then the Supreme Court would have confered a university degree on a person, by all evidence, shows that he never actually went to study at the Kampala University,” senior counsel James Orengo, who appeared for the second respondent said during the hearing of the petition.
With this petition being first of its kind since the Supreme Court was set up after the 2010 referendum, lawyers and other interested parties will note down how the apex court will go about that urgument.
“It will be travesty of justice if the Supreme Court fails to uphold the decision of the court of appeal.
“No way around it unless the Supreme Court will give him a degree,” Mohamed Doli, a law practitioner in Canada, said.
The Wajir petition received such a national attention that it appeared on the second page of the Sunday Nation, the paper with the highest circulation in the week.
It’s also a bated breath for the people of Wajir County as they patiently wait for the outcome of a court process that took nearly two years to complete.