Juliana Cherera presiding over repeat election will be disastrous – Fred Ngatia

President-elect William Ruto's lawyer Fred Ngatia has opined that appointed IEBC vice Chair Juliana Cherera to preside over a repeat presidential election would be disastrous for Kenya.

While making his submissions in the Supreme Court, Ngatia dismissed a proposal to have Cherera preside over a fresh poll, should the court permit saying it was not the solution.

He lambasted the main petitioner in the consolidated presidential election petition, Raila Odinga, of not wanting to concede defeat after his main rival Ruto was declared winner.

“The petitioner does not want to accept defeat and offers the solution that there be an election presided over by Cherera. This will cause a crisis of monumental nature, a crisis that you will not be able to put off the fire. This is because the crisis will be fire upon the fire,” Ngatia said.

Ngatia further argued that disbanding IEBC as currently constituted would land the country and outgoing President Uhuru Kenyatta in a constitutional crisis of momentous proportions.

“We now have the incumbent in office and has limitations that are cast in stone by the constitution. The incumbent in the office cannot even appoint anyone to take over from the IEBC before you,” Ngatia noted.

The lawyer representing the UDA party boss asked the court bench to dismiss the presidential election petition and trashed Raila’s claim that some forms 34A were altered.

“If it was true that the forms 34A were changed mid-air, that is the work of fiction. Amongst the many things the court is being asked to do, I want to urge the court to moderate the excesses in the political contestants.”

He further trashed the proposal by lawyers acting for Raila and Martha Karua to the court to declare the Azimio presidential candidate the winner of the August 9 general election.