Here is why you should not blame Mahama for Kenya’s SC ruling

The Supreme Court in Kenya has annulled the result of the countrys presidential election held in 2017.

The court cited irregularities and indicated that a new poll should be organized within 60 days, BBC reports.

However, some Ghanaians are blaming former President John Mahama for not doing a good job as part of the thousands of observers that were there during the election.

He must not be blamed and below are the reasons.

• Kenya is a sovereign state

Just as Ghana is a sovereign State so is Kenya. In Ghana and many parts of the world, every country wants their autonomy to be respected. Kenya in this election petition and ruling showed the authority it has to govern itself.

This is to say the final decision rests with Kenya’s Supreme Court and not what observer missions say.

• The ruling by Kenya’s Supreme Court is based on evidence

In the law court, we are always told evidence is the name of the game. After the plaintiff filed the suit, he insisted during the hearing that the election results be audited.

Raila Odinga said that the results were manipulated after claims that the commission's IT system had been hacked.

The Court then ordered the country’s electoral body Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) to open up their server for an independent audit.

The audit report revealed that there was unauthorised and unidentifiable access granted into the Servers.

How were Mahama and other observer groups supposed to see this? Mind you the results were not compromised at the polling stations but rather at the backend of the servers.

• There were several other observer groups

Former President John Mahama was not the only observer in Kenya during the polls. There some international observer groups that came months before Mahama arrived in the country. Other observer groups were led by Former South Africa President Thabo Mbeki and yet another by a former US Secretary of State, John Kerry.

There were thousands of people belonging to different observer groups. You cannot blame Mahama nor the other observers for any flaw.

• Observers are not Judges

International observers must not interfere with the work of electoral administrators. They are expected are only to observe, report and assess.

That was what all the groups did. So why blame them?

Remember international observers do not make or interpret laws.