The Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission now says that it follows the law in picking John Mbadi’s successor.
In a statement on Wednesday, the IEBC said the party list followed was the one submitted to the Commission by ODM in July 2022, and from it, the next qualified person for nomination was Harold Kipchumba.
The Commission noted that, according to the Elections Act, the next qualified nominee is in order of gender and priority as submitted in the party list.
“Section 37 of the Elections Act and Regulation 56B of the Elections (General) Regulations, 2012, provide that a party list seat that falls vacant shall be re-allocated to the next qualified nominee in order of gender and priority, as originally submitted by the political party.
“In this case, the nominee who qualified under the law was Mr. Harold Kimuge Kipchumba, who is of the same gender as Hon. Mbadi and was the next in line on the submitted list,” IEBC said.
A section of ODM party members had publicly expressed concerns regarding the Commission's decision to re-allocate the party list seat to Kipchumba.
They claimed that the process was neither procedural nor lawful.
The IEBC, however, insisted that this was not true.
“Respectfully, this is not accurate.”
The
Orange party’s Youth League opposed the nomination of Harold Kipchumba as a
replacement for Mbadi, led by their President John Ketora and his deputy
Martin Muthusi.
They
argued that the IEBC made an error by appointing Kipchumba under the Persons
with Disabilities category instead of selecting Ketora, whom they claim was
next in line under the “Workers” category on the party list.
“We cannot
replace a worker with a person with disability category because they already
had their slot,” said Muthusi, asserting that Ketora, as the second name on the
workers’ list, was the appropriate replacement.
The Youth
League leaders urged the IEBC to review what they termed an anomaly and
allocate the seat to Ketora in line with the party’s list.
Another party
official, David Kantai, criticised the IEBC’s decision and called for the
nomination to be rescinded.
Ketora, while
distancing the ODM leadership from the matter, blamed the IEBC for what he
described as an injustice to the party.
“I will not
expose my secret card, but we have reinforced every corner to ensure we handle
this matter expeditiously,” he said.
