The World Briefly

September 06, 2022

Making It Official

Kenya

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Kenya’s Supreme Court upheld last month’s presidential election result that declared Deputy President William Ruto as the winner, a verdict that came days after opposition candidate Raila Odinga filed a petition over alleged electoral fraud, CNN reported Monday.

In early August, the country’s electoral commission declared Ruto as the winner of the elections, winning slightly more than 50 percent of the vote, while Odinga had secured nearly 49 percent.

But the announcement was met with controversy after four commission members rejected the results and declared the tallying “opaque.”

Odinga and his supporters petitioned the top court to assess the matter, alleging a number of irregularities, including claims that hackers had accessed the electoral body’s website, deducted his votes and added them to Ruto’s.

But the court rejected his claims, saying it found no evidence of tampering and that the election commission “carried out the verification, tallying, and declaration of results in accordance with the provided constitutional law.”

Ruto welcomed the decision even as Odinga said he “vehemently disagreed” with the verdict.

This was the fifth time Odinga ran for president and the third time he challenged his loss at the Supreme Court. He previously contested the results in the 2013 and 2017 votes.

The Supreme Court made history in 2017 when it ordered the election annulled and required a do-over election. But Odinga boycotted the second vote having already lost to incumbent President Uhuru Kenyatta in the first election.

This story originally appeared in the September 06, 2022 newsletter, Pinned Down.