Ok, got home, looked at them....and....OMG!!!
People, look at those sections by themselves and then go back and re-read the court's reasoning and tell me I'm court-bashing when I say this interpretation is entirely imaginary and truly ASININE. The court basically is reinventing the simple, natural meaning of the word "fresh" used for the invalidation scenario to make up a whole bunch of restrictions that don't exist in that term at all. It seems to have done so by mixing up the word "fresh" in the provision for
no-round-one winner (which provides for no. 1 and 2); with its use in the bit on an
invalidated election. Please read the two sections by themselves without assuming anything and tell me how in the world these six people (to quote Uhuru!
) decided that "fresh" meant "petitioners only"???? or implies anything about a no. 2
One paragraph says that the fresh election is essentially a repeat of the
invalidated one so that there's no need for the nomination stage. That seems a reasonable enough interpretation. And then from this the court inexplicably says that in addition, among those who participated in the first election, only those who petitioned the court can participate in this repeat exercise. There is nothing remotely implying this anywhere except what the court has basically invented and injected into "fresh". So while the court should have answered "how fresh" the new elections should be, deciding between these two reasonable interpretations: either with potentially brand new candidates or just a repeat of the bangled exercise with the same set of candidates, the court jumped from all this and added something not in any way implied by "fresh elections": petitioners only!!!!
The court seems to have confused itself by mixing up the use of fresh in those two different contexts. That's the only explanation I can think of for bringing up a no. 2 in the event of invalidation. (And if we are to be logical here, how could there be a no. 2 in a nullified exercise?)
What was up with that bunch? Please look at those provisions and tell me if you would ever think of "petitioners only" or "person with the second most votes" from the term "fresh elections". Or was the court using the drafting history of those provisions to infer what what was intended there when it was crafted (and didn't quote it)? I doubt that was the intention behind it because it seems a simple sub-section making that clear would have been simple enough rather than this convoluted reasoning...But I don't get where the "petitioners only" came from with "fresh elections". Amazing. Wonder whether this was another "political decision"?
On the bright side, I think everyone on nipate is qualified to be a judge in Kenya's high courts as everyone here reasons TONNES better than this when defending their arguments.