Thousands of the former Nairobi governor's supporters thronged the road leading to Mombasa State House in celebrations.
The Mombasa county IEBC offices are located adjacent to State House, Mombasa.
The elated supporters chanted praises in support of Sonko. "Si uchawi ni maombi!"
Sonko’s clearance came on the same day when Raila Odinga, the Azimio la Umoja Coalition presidential candidate, was campaigning in Mombasa.
Raila has endorsed Mvita MP Abdulswamad Nassir for the Mombasa governor race.
Sonko’s entry into the race is expected to complicate the math for Nassir, who was poised to win the race by a landslide after his main competitor, businessman Suleiman Shahbal, stepped down in his favour.
The former governor arrived at the IEBC offices at 2.50pm accompanied by his running mate, Ali Mbogo.
Mbogo is the current Kisauni MP.
The clearance by IEBC took roughly 45 minutes.
After clearance, Sonko described the entire process as a victory for Mombasa.
“We want to thank all our supporters for standing with us. This is a new dawn for Mombasa,” he said.
He said he will make sure that he unites Mombasa residents. “Our victory will bring development in Mombasa, peace and co-existence.”
Sonko dismissed claims that he won judicial favours because President Uhuru Kenyatta intervened.
On Tuesday, Sonko reunited with President Kenyatta and the Nairobi Metropolitan Service boss Mohammed Badi during the President's development tour in Nairobi.
On Wednesday, a three-judge bench that was hearing his petition against IEBC ruled in favour of Sonko.
Justices Olga Sewe, Ann Ong'injo' and Stephen Githinji allowed Sonko’s petition challenging IEBC’s decision to disqualify him from the race on the allegation of breach of Article 75 of the constitution.
A section of the people started reading mischief.
“I want people to stop attacking the Judiciary. The Judiciary is very independent. We won because we followed the law,” he said.
He said Johnson Sakaja was declared for the Nairobi governor race, but no one said the Judiciary was influenced in making its decision.
“Senator Sakaja was sued and he won and everyone was silent. Why is it that people are making noise that the 'Deep State' helped us?” Sonko said.
He added that they are going to mount an extensive campaign for the remaining three weeks.
“We are going to structure our calendar to ensure that in the remaining days we traverse all the six constituencies of Mombasa to campaign vigorously,” he said.
Mbogo, who had accompanied Sonko for clearance, said they only need one week to take over Mombasa county.
"Mombasa has six subcounties. With the remaining 25 days, we can do at least four meetings per subcounty every day. For us, we only need one week to campaign,” he said.
Others cleared for Mombasa include Hezron Awiti (VDP), Hassan Omar (UDA), Wiliam Kingi (PAA), Daniel Kitsao (Independent), Shafii Makazi (Upia), and Said Abdhalla (Usawa).
(edited by Amol Awuor)
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