Seats declared vacant

Written By:Kennedy Osir , Posted: Fri, Aug 13, 2010

In a Kenya Gazette notice published Friday, National Assembly speaker Kenneth Marende has issued the writs for Starehe and Wajir South constituencies.

This follows high court rulings last month in favour of election petitions filed against the incumbent members of parliament.

Starehe MP Margaret Wanjiru lost her seat on July 30th after Justice Kihara Kariuki ruled that she was not validly elected as the poll was marred by massive tampering of election material.

However, Justice Kihara declined to grant prayers by the petitioner Maina Kamanda who had requested the court to declare him the validly elected Starehe MP to avoid a by-election.

Mid last month, Wajir South MP Abdirahman Ali Hassan's election was nullified with Justice Luka Kimaru criticising officials of the defunct Electoral Commission of Kenya officials for transferring two polling stations only 24 hours before the election therefore confusing voters.

Hassan had won the seat on a KANU ticket and the petition was filed by the then ODM candidate Mohamed Sirat.

The Interim Independent Electoral Commission has already set September 20th as the date for by-elections in Juja and Makadara constituencies.

The seats also fell vacant in a string of election petitions filed against sitting MPs over election irregularities.