National Assembly Majority Leader Aden Duale during a media briefing at Parliament on March 31, 2016 He has opposed Farah Maalim's bid to access election materials. [Photo: The Star]
Garissa Township MP Aden Duale now wants an election petition court to dismiss an application by his rival in the August 8 general election, Farah Maalim, seeking to access poll materials.Maalim has moved to the court to challenge Duale's victory on the basis of electoral malpractices.He wants the court to direct that the incumbent legislator and the electoral commission jointly committed poll irregularities and that IEBC ordered to conduct fresh election in the constituency.But Duale, through his lawyer Ahmednasir Abdullahi, said all election materials for Garissa Township are in the safe custody of the electoral agency.IEBC also opposed the application to have the voters' register given to the petitioner, saying there was no manual register."The court should reject the application as the petitioner did not write a formal letter requesting the information within 28 days after the third respondent was declared the winner," said Issa Mansour, the IEBC lawyer.Justice Hedwig Ong'undi, however, allowed Maalim to file additional affidavits in the petition.