Hanging on a prayer and UDA favour — 11 MCAs removed by court won't challenge verdict
A view of Uasin Gishu County Assembly in Eldoret town in this picture taken on November 02, 2022.
What you need to know:
- People living with disabilities in Uasin Gishu county are the biggest beneficiaries of Wednesday's ruling by Chief Magistrate Dennis Mikoyan
- The magistrate nullified the nomination of the 11 MCAs, saying IEBC had relied on a list that had been disowned by the Political Parties Tribunal
- People with disabilities in Uasin Gishu moved to court to challenge the nominations
- They have praised the verdict of the Eldoret court, saying the magistrate delivered justice
Some of the immediate former MCAs of the Uasin Gishu County Assembly whose nomination was revoked by an Eldoret court on Wednesday will not appeal against the ruling, indicating that they are waiting for communication from their party on the way forward.
Led by Ms Belinda Tirop, the affected 11 former MCAs said on Thursday that they are not in a hurry to appeal the ruling, until they get further directions from the leadership of the United Democratic Alliance (UDA) party.
“For now, we are yet to decide whether or not to appeal the ruling which revoked our nomination. We are waiting for further directions from our party headquarters for the next course of action,” said Ms Tirop in a phone interview with Nation.Africa.
“For now, we are in deep prayers hoping that our party will come to our rescue. This is a party matter and not an individual issue,” said Ms Tirop.
She said the party is yet to give them directions on the matter. She was hopeful that if the lower court ruling will not be challenged in the High Court, some of them will be retained.
Ms Tirop urged all affected MCAs to be patient and not to rush to appeal in court, but wait for direction from the party leadership.
“We have no say on this matter. It was a legal issue and we are waiting to see if our party will respond in the same way,” said Ms Saida Abdi, whose nomination was also revoked.
PWDs celebrate
People living with disabilities in Uasin Gishu county are the biggest beneficiaries of Wednesday's ruling by Chief Magistrate Dennis Mikoyan that nullified the nomination of the 11 MCAs.
Some of the people with disabilities in Uasin Gishu County, who staged demos in Eldoret town on September 19, 2022 after names of their representatives were struck from the UDA Nominated MCAs list that was gazetted by the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission, (IEBC). They have praised the verdict of the Eldoret court that nullified nomination of 11 UDA MCAs, saying the magistrate had delivered justice.
The Eldoret magistrate said the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) had relied on a list that had been disowned by the Political Parties Tribunal, to make the nominations, hence they were illegal.
Representatives of people with disabilities in Uasin Gishu who had moved to court to challenge the nominations praised the verdict of the Eldoret court, saying it had delivered justice.
Speaking in Eldoret on Thursday, they said UDA had left them out in the nominations to the county assembly, despite their names having been approved by the Political Parties Tribunal.
They regretted that their plea to President William Ruto, the UDA party leader, and his deputy Rigathi Gachagua to intervene was futile, forcing them to move to court to challenge the nominations.
Mr Robert Kiptanui Chering from Turbo sub-county, who was among the shortlisted nominees to represent people with disabilities, said his name went missing mysteriously from the list, even though it had allegedly been approved by the UDA party.
Mr Chering said the court ruling was a big breakthrough for people with disabilities in Uasin Gishu County.
“Our names had been approved three times. We were perplexed to see different names being published in the Kenya Gazette notice. The ruling was just,” he said, urging the UDA leadership to accept the ruling, and the order of the court and gazette them as nominated MCAs as directed by the court.
He also urged those whose nominations had been revoked not to appeal.
Justice served
Another beneficiary of the ruling, Ms Veronicah Chepkemei, said the ruling had proved that even poor people can get justice through court.
Ms Chepkemei, a resident of Kapseret sub-county said it was unfortunate that their names had been approved but later on they were shortchanged.
“We want to thank our President for supporting our move to seek justice through court and we hope that the ruling of the court will be followed by IEBC and the UDA party leadership,” said Ms Chepkemei.
They cautioned politicians from Uasin Gishu against interfering with the matter.
Mr Willson Mulwa termed the court ruling timely. He is hopeful that President Ruto will support the ruling.
“Our prayer is that President Ruto will support the ruling since he has been advocating the independence of the judiciary. This ruling must be honored by all Kenyans who are law-abiding citizens,” he said.
He said for a long time people with disabilities in Uasin Gishu have been short-changed when it comes to nominations to the county assembly, stating that some of the people who claim to represent the disabled are impersonators.
“We hope this time our rights will be respected,” he stated.
Ms Regina Chumba, who applied to be nominated but missed out, said the ruling was a big breakthrough. She said nine members of the disability group applied for nomination slots, but only three were shortlisted.
“This ruling will bring to an end the blatant exclusion of people with disabilities. For a long time, we have been discriminated against and neglected,” Ms Chumba said.
