• The elections involve over 600,000 shareholders.
• The court was told to consider the order stopping elections will have adversely affect the operations.
Image: FILE
Kenya Tea Development Agency can now go ahead and hold elections for its directors after a judge dismissed a case seeking to stop the exercise.
High Court judge Anthony Mrima on Thursday dismissed an application filed by Agriculture Fisheries and Food Authority opposing the elections on the grounds that the tea sector has no legal framework for conducting the election.
“I now find and hold that the second respondent [AFFA] failed to demonstrate the prejudice it was likely to suffer if the application was not allowed,” the judge held.
He noted that if he gave a temporary order stopping the election at this point, that will have an effect of delaying the main case.
In its application, AFFA contended that since the Tea Regulations of 2020 were suspended by the High Court in Mombasa – and pending the hearing and determination of two other cases against the regulations - there lacked a legal framework under which the elections would be conducted.
AFFA argued that the elections could not be held under the old regulations, adding that the now-suspended regulations superseded the old rules.
The court was asked to maintain the status quo until the case is heard and determined. AFFA was of the view that holding elections at the moment would preempt the expected court renditions.
The state law office also supported the plea to stop the election in order to avoid wastage of resources.
State counsel Mitchelle Omuom said the electoral process was expensive and since there was a possibility of the court upholding the impugned regulations, holding elections which may be later nullified was a waste of resources.
KTDA, for its part, opposed the case saying that the membership and tenure of board of directors are internal management matters whose control is the exclusive reserve of shareholders of the companies involved.
It accused both Agriculture Cabinet Secretary Peter Munya and AFFA of unsuccessfully trying to control internal affairs of KTDA.
KTDA urged the court to take note of the fact that AFFA failed to show any of its rights allegedly being violated if the election is allowed.
It was said that AFFA is not a shareholder in any of the companies and it had not even applied to be a director in any of the companies, hence has no business interfering with conduct of the election of directors.
The elections involve over 600,000 shareholders. The court was told to consider the order stopping elections will have adversely affect the operations of the KTDA which in turn will have an insurmountable ripple effect to the greater public.
The judge in his ruling further directed the parties to come for hearing of the main petition on October 13.