Raila’s Withdrawal Suffers Major Blow after Today’s Court Ruling

NASA leader Raila Odinga on Tuesday suffered a major blow after the High Court ruled on a petition filed by lawyer Ekuru Aukot seeking to be allowed to contest in the repeat presidential election.

Justice John Mativo read the ruling stating that Supreme Court ruling did not anticipate a re-run but a fresh election where all those who had contested in the August 8 election would be allowed to vie.

"The fresh election in the current context should involve all the candidates who participated in the annulled election," Mativo stated.

The judge further ruled that the Supreme Court advisory opinion was not legally binding terming it as obiter dictum.

"Issues of obiter dictum are not precedent or legally binding," the High Court ruled.

The IEBC had initially relied on the Supreme Court advisory opinion which has stated that the repeat election would be between the winning candidate and the other candidate who got the second-highest number of votes.

The ruling now throws Odinga's plan of cancelling the repeat election through a withdrawal since the repeat election will now involve President Uhuru Kenyatta and Mr Aukot.

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