High court to rule next week whether Wavinya Ndeti is guilty of party hopping

0
Wiper gubernatorial aspirant Wavinya Ndeti outside Milimani Law Courts

Wiper Gubernatorial aspirant Wavinya Ndeti will now her fate next week when the high court will deliver a ruling on whether her nomination will be nullified on grounds of party hopping.

High court judge Justice George Odunga made the declaration after the inter-party hearing of an appeal by Wavinya.

In their submissions, IEBC maintained that Wavinya did not resign from Chama Cha Uzalendo (CCU) before joining the Wiper Democratic Movement as required by the law.

IEBC lawyer Paul Nyamodi argued that she was gulty of party hoping and therefore not eligible to be nominated by any party to contest in any seat in the upcoming general elections.

“The grounds made by Wavinya in this case including that of legitimate expectations have not be proved and for those reasons the application for judicial review should be dismissed with costs,” Nyamodi submitted.

He added that as of the date of the purported resignation, that is April 6th 2017, Wavinya was still a member of CCU.

In their submission IEBC further told the court that Wavinya only became a member of Wiper Party on the April 24th 2017 when CCU entered into a coalition agreement with wiper party.

In her submissions through her lawyer, Wavinya questioned the jurisdiction of the IEBC committee to determine the question of party membership saying that the powers to determine membership is vested on the political parties Dispute Tribunal.

She further told the court that IEBC had no jurisdiction to hear and determine the matter filed before the electoral commission committee.

She also submitted that IEBC was a wrong forum for the petitioner to raise his complaint against Wavinya Ndeti.

She further submitted that the MCA was not a candidate during the nomination process adding that he came in at the last minute as a busy body adding that the only avenue for him was to appeal against the decision at the high court not IEBC.

She urged Justice Odunga to quash the IEBC committee decision that barred her from contesting in the August polls.