Odinga rejects presidential election results, calls for legal action

Nairobi, Aug 16 (EFE).- Kenya opposition leader Raila Odinga Tuesday rejected “without reservation” the presidential election result in which he was defeated in a tight runoff against William Ruto.

“Our view is that the figures announced by the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) chairman Wafula Chebukati are null and void and must be quashed by court of law,” Odinga told a press conference in Nairobi.

“In our view, there’s neither a legally and valid declared winner nor a president elect,” he added.

The IEBC declared Monday Ruto as the winner of the August 9 presidential election with 50.4% of votes against Odinga who secured 48.8% of votes.

Odinga’s comments came after four of seven election commissioners dissociated themselves from the result and said the final vote counting had been carried out in an “opaque” manner.

“The law does not vest in the chairman, the powers of a dictator to rule IEBC unilaterally, (…) decisions must be taken by consensus or by a vote of the majority,” Odinga said.

The former prime minister added his team would pursue “all constitutional and legal options available to us,” to challenge the “illegal” results.

“Let no one take the law into their own hands,” the 77-year-old said.

Under Kenyan law, Odinga has seven days from the announcement of the results to legally challenge them in the Supreme Court. Once the complaint has been lodged, the court has a legal deadline of 14 days to issue its ruling.

It is the fifth time Odinga contests results during decades as an opposition leader, in which time he has lost five presidential elections.

After his narrow defeat in the 2007 election, his allegations of fraud sparked a wave of violence that left over 1,100 people dead and 600,000 internally displaced.

In 2017, the Supreme Court accepted his appeal and called for a second round of voting, which Odinga boycotted claiming the necessary reforms had not been implemented. EFE

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