UDA candidate Shallo challenges Machele's Mvita win in court

Mr Omar Shallo, the United Democratic Alliance (UDA) Mvita parliamentary candidate in the August 9 polls, has moved to the court to contest the election of Mohamed Machele as Member of Parliament. 

Mr Shallo has claimed in the court documents that the election in which Mr Machele of Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) was declared the winner was marred with irregularities and voter bribery. 

Further, the UDA candidate alleged that the elections were not free, fair, credible and transparent and therefore did not reflect the will of the voters. 

“The elections were fundamentally flawed and marred with irregularities and discrepancies, which compromised the whole process and affected the overall results as declared by the IEBC,” he said. 

Mr Machele was declared winner by the Independent,  Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) after garnering 22,611 votes while Mr Shallo was second with 11,125.  

The petitioner also alleges that some polling stations were opened late but the IEBC did not extend voting period to compensate for the time lost. According to the petitioner, areas which were opened late caused confusion to voters who had turned up as early as 5am to cast their ballots. 

“Most voters did not cast their ballots in these polling stations because of that confusion, thus affecting the outcome of voters who had been mobilized by campaigns to wake up early and vote. The failure to open the stations early was ill motivated and done in bad faith to my detriment and that of my supporters,” he said. 

Mr Shallo further alleges that the elections were marred by voter bribery, where his opponent bribed voters with Sh1,000 to cast votes in his favour.

The petitioner also laments that hired goods who were dressed in military attires were used to intimidate voters with violence, which he said disenfranchised them and influenced the final outcome by tilting the results in Mr Machele’s favour. 

 “IEBC illegally conducted elections in ungazetted polling stations thus causing confusion to many registered voters who could not vote in their respective areas,” he said. 

The petitioner has also lamented that the elections were not free and fair because most polling stations which he believed to be his strongholds were marred with extreme cases of violence which was meted upon his agents, poll officials and even the security personnel. 

On rigging, the petitioner has claimed that votes were inflated in certain polling stations thus affecting the outcome of the declared results. 

For instance, at Allidina Visram polling station 2, he said the total number of registered voters were 690 while the total number of votes cast were 1,369. 

“This is numerically impossible, and does not reflect the actual verifiable outcome of the will of the people,” he said. 

Mr Shallo has pleaded that based on the anomaly at the Allidina Visram polling station 2, and the incidences of violence, it would not be easy for the court to rule judiciously on the anomalies unless ballot boxes and voter scrutiny is conducted. 

“It is numerically impossible to tell the winner of the elections for the Mvita parliamentary seat,” he said. 

The petitioner has also accused the presiding officers for misconduct, alleging that they filled results declaration forms at the constituency tallying centre in the absence of the agents of the candidates or political parties. 

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