Trouble is brewing between Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) elections board and the party’s appeals tribunal.
Some members of ODM’s appeals tribunal, which has been handling cases lodged by dissatisfied aspirants, expressed frustrations that the party’s National Elections Board (NEB) was ignoring some of their rulings.
The NEB that is chaired by Judith Pareno has been accused of handing certificates to disputed winners in disregard to the tribunal’s directive that repeat elections be held following successful petitions by losers.
“We have had cases where we rule that in some areas no elections were held and repeat nominations must be done, yet NEB goes ahead and announces winners. This has made our work hard,” said one of the tribunal members.
The tribunal is headed by Willis Otieno, and has Mohamed Hajir, Florence Omose, George Muthama and Charles Bosire as members. They had threatened to resign, fearing for their lives after goons disrupted one of the sessions.
Some of the aspirants who lost in the nominations said the tribunal was fair in its dealings but accused NEB of conniving with party bigwigs to deny them justice.
As a result, some have gone to the Political Parties Disputes Tribunal (PPDT), fearing that NEB would disregard the tribunal’s rulings.
Otieno, however, downplayed the rift between the tribunal and NEB.
The tribunal overturned ODM chairman John Mbadi’s victory and criticised the Suba MP for snubbing summons to appear before it during the hearings held at Mash Park Hotel.
On April 28, the tribunal ruled that the provisional certificate issued to Mbadi should be revoked and that NEB should repeat the nominations.
But on Saturday, NEB resolved to award Mbadi the ticket in spite of the tribunal ruling that nullified the results in Suba over massive irregularities.
His rival, Caroli Omondi, has now obtained orders from PPDT stopping the party from awarding a nomination certificate to its Mbadi.
PPDT chairman Kyalo Mbobu ordered him to serve ODM, Mbadi and constituency returning officer Duncan Nyabilo by yesterday before hearing, which is set for today at 11am.
Flawed nomination
For Nyali constituency, the tribunal ruled that the nomination exercise there did not meet the threshold of free and fair elections. It also ruled that the party national elections committee reconsider the process of selecting a party candidate.
And in Taita Taveta, Wundanyi MP Thomas Mwadeghu was declared the winner but Governor John Mruttu lodged a complaint, indicating no elections were held in some polling centres.
The appeals tribunal revoked Mwadeghu’s victory and ordered repeat polls. They didn’t take place. Mwadeghu has since been declared the winner. Mruttu Wednesday obtained orders from PPDT barring Mwadeghu from presenting his nomination certificate to IEBC.
ponyango@standardmedia.co.ke
