Parliamentary election aftermath-Court to hear PDM case on October 18 |07 October 2011

The Constitutional Court presided over by Chief Justice Fredrick Egonda-Ntende and assisted by Judges Burham and Duncan Gaswaga are hearing the case in which the PDM and its leader, David Pierre, are represented by lawyer Basil Hoareau.

The first respondent in the case, the Electoral Commission, is represented by lawyer Frank Ally, while the second respondent, the Attorney General, is representing himself.

The PDM, which polled 10.89% of the valid votes in last weekend’s poll, is contesting the fact that it was not allocated a seat. 

After announcing the results early Sunday morning, the Electoral Commission allocated only six proportionate seats, which all went to the Parti Lepep, instead of the usual nine.

The main hurdle was the inability of the Electoral Commission to come up with documents it says is “relevant” to the case  -- five days after the election -- and  CJ Egonda has given its counsel until October 12 to do so.

The court was also told that a hearing of the newly elected National Assembly will not take place until all the names of proportionally elected members are officially announced and gazetted.

It was confirmed in court that to date, no names linked to proportionally elected seats have been sent to the Electoral Commission by any political party which took part in the parliamentary election.