Bench of five to hear MP's case

By WAHOME THUKU

A bench of five Court of Appeal judges will now hear an appeal filed by Kamukunji MP Simon Mbugua in a petition challenging his election.

The order to have a five-judge bench constituted was made yesterday by three Court of Appeal judges, Moijo ole Keiwua, Alnashir Visram and Daniel Aganyanya.

The decision by the five will have a bearing on another election petition against Naivasha MP John Mututho, which was dismissed by the same court two years ago.

The order for the five-judge bench was made following an application by Ibrahim Ahmed, who is challenging Mbugua’s election. Mbugua was declared winner with 22,614 votes, while Ahmed garnered 16,604 votes. The results were announced eight months after the December 2007 election following a court order.

The petition challenging Mututho’s election was thrown out in November 2008 because petitioner Jayne Kihara had not attached the results of all Naivasha parliamentary candidates as required under the electoral law.

Petitions dismissed

The judgement by three Court of Appeal judges has since been used by some MPs to have petitions against them dismissed on similar grounds.

Mbugua took advantage of it and asked the High Court to dismiss the petition against him on grounds that the petitioner had also not attached results of all the 25 Kamukunji parliamentary candidates.

High Court judge Kalpana Rawal rejected the application prompting Mbugua to appeal. When the appeal went for hearing yesterday, lawyer Stephen Owino for the petitioner said they wanted a five-judge bench to hear it and submitted that Kamukunji Returning Officer breached electoral regulations and consequently no results were announced, which they could attach to the petition papers.

He argued that since three judges had decided the Mututho case, a bench of five was required to look at it again and determine if it was a proper decision.