NASA suffers blow after judge quits crucial case

juma chrispinus

August 2, 2017 2:23 PM

This is a major setback to Nasa, five days to elections

Raila Odinga-led National Super Alliance (NASA) has suffered yet another major blow in court on Wednesday.

An appeal case on election back up system failed to kick off for the second time. So far two crucial Court of Appeal Judges have disqualified themselves from hearing the controversial appeal.

The conflict of interest took centre stage as appellate Judges Agnes Murgor and Gatembu Kairu opted to quit the highly anticipated case.

Judge Kairu said that he is related to Senior Counsel Paul Muite while Murgor said that she has searched herself and is not able to hear and determine the appeal by the opposition.

Read: Jubilee's letter to CJ Maraga regarding judge Odunga

On Monday, the hearing failed to kick off after Justice Kihara Kariuki disqualified himself on grounds that he had sat in another case ballot papers appeal filed by the same parties.

In the case, NASA is challenging a high court ruling that ruled that IEBC had credible back up system in the August 8 elections.

NASA wants the Court of Appeal to overturn the decision saying court erred in law when it failed to stop IEBC from using a manual back-up system in case technology fails during the polls.

The standoff means that the case lacks merit and as such may be dropped as the election is just five days away.

juma chrispinus