Article and Response

Kenya's Supreme Court has nullified the result of the August 8 presidential electionwon by President Uhuru Kenyatta.

In a ruling issued on Friday, the court said the electoral board committed "irregularities and illegalities" during last month's vote, harming the integrity of the election.

The court ordered another presidential election to be held within 60 days. 

"The declaration [of Kenyatta's win] is invalid, null and void," said Judge David Maraga, announcing the verdict of four out of the six judges.

No presidential election in Kenya has ever before been nullified.

Maraga said the election commission "failed, neglected or refused to conduct the presidential election in a manner consistent with the dictates of the constitution".

A lawyer for Kenyatta, Ahmednasir Abdullahi, said the decision was "very political" and the election board had "done nothing wrong". But he said the decision had to be respected.

The protest was brought before the Supreme Court by opposition leader Raila Odinga.

Kenyatta was announced the winner with 54 percent of the vote - but Odinga claimed the election was rigged with electronic voting results hacked into and manipulated in favour of Kenyatta.

Kenya's electoral commission had said there was a hacking attempt but it had failed. International election observers said they saw no interference with the vote.

Odinga supporters erupted in jubilation after the decision was announced.

"This is an unprecedented ruling," Odinga said outside the court. "This is a triumph for the people of Kenya."

He condemned members of the electoral board and vowed to press for criminal proceedings.

"We have no faith at all in the electoral commission as currently constituted. They have committed criminal acts," said Odinga.

"Most of them actually belong [in] jail and, therefore, we are going to ask for prosecution of all the electoral commission officers who have caused this monstrous crime against the people of Kenya."

Odinga's lawyer had asked the court to invalidate Kenyatta's win, saying a scrutiny of the forms used to tally the votes had anomalies that affected nearly five million votes.

Odinga said the ruling sets a precedent for the African continent and he thanked the judges for acting "for posterity of Kenyans".

Residents in the western city of Kisumu, where Odinga has strong backing, celebrated in the streets. Motorcycle riders honked their horns.

"Today is a special today and I will celebrate until I am worn out," said 32-year-old Kevin Ouma.

East Africa's biggest economy has a history of disputed elections. A dispute over the 2007 poll, which Odinga challenged after being declared loser, was followed by weeks of ethnic bloodshed in which more than 1,200 were killed.

Al Jazeera's Mohammed Adow, reporting from the court in Nairobi, said Friday's ruling was "historic, unprecedented anywhere in Africa". 

"The judges found that the electoral commission did not conduct the election according to the constitution and the electoral laws of Kenya. They say there have been massive irregularities in the transmission of the results from the polling station to the national tallying centre," said Adow.

"This verdict given today raises a lot of questions." 

Unease around the election rose when the official who oversaw the electronic voting system was found tortured and killed days before the vote.

Security was tight around the court on Friday with armed police and barricaded streets. Human rights groups have said police killed at least 24 people in the unrest that followed the August 8 vote.

Odinga has contested the last three elections and lost each time. After each one, he has claimed the votes were marred by rigging. In 2013, the Supreme Court dismissed his petition.

This time, his team focused on proving that the process for tallying and transmitting results was flawed, rather than proving how much of the vote was rigged.

Source: Al Jazeera and news agencies

Citation:
."Kenya's Supreme Court has Nullified." Al Jazeera, August 30, 2017, www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/09/kenya's-supreme-court-has-nullified. Accessed August 30. 2017.

Response:
This Article is dealing with a very intension topic for Kenya, talking about a issue that has never happened in Kenya's history. I believe this article was intended for the people that are on Uhuru's side. Based on the commits such as "this has never been done before in Kenya's history", and "Odinga, was the one who proclaimed the rigged system", causing a shift to blame this situation on Odinga. This means that the writer of this article is looking through the lances of Uhuru's side as well. the Bias that the publisher might have is leaning towards the Jubilee Party. the bias that the reader might have is a the idea that they have no bias, do to the people that will be reading this, who are mainly not of Kenyan dissent, or not familiar with  Kenyan politics. the main purpose of this article is to present the situation as a whole, with as much truth as possible. However, based on the material inside the article it appears to have somewhat of a bias, but what can we expect, we are all bias in one way or another.