By Kepher Otieno - Reporter
Kenya, 26 December 2025 - Prime Cabinet Secretary Musalia Mudavadi’s warning about the possible nullification of the 2027 General Election reflects a deep and deliberate expression of fear—not political panic, but institutional alarm.
His remarks reveal anxiety within the state about a collision between constitutional law, court decisions, and rigid electoral timelines that could push Kenya into an unprecedented legal crisis.
At the core of Mudavadi’s fear is legality.
He repeatedly insists that the crisis is not hypothetical, stressing: “No valid population census data, no valid boundaries review, no general elections. That is the law and not my words.”
This framing is significant.
In anchoring his argument in constitutional provisions rather than political opinion, Mudavadi is signaling concern that the country may head into 2027 with elections that are procedurally indefensible in court.
His fear is that even if elections are held, they could collapse under judicial scrutiny before or immediately after voting.
Mudavadi’s anxiety is heightened by time. With only 20 months to the polls, he describes the situation as a narrowing legal tunnel.
“It is only 20 months remaining for the 2027 elections to be conducted… 2027 is a referendum moment,” he warned. This reflects a fear that constitutional processes—boundary review, census validation, and legal reforms—cannot realistically be completed within the remaining timeframe without extraordinary political intervention. In his view, delay itself has become a threat.
The boundary review failure is central to this concern. The Constitution requires electoral boundaries to be reviewed every eight to twelve years, yet the IEBC missed its March 2024 deadline.
Mudavadi describes the current moment bluntly: “We are now in a period of non-constitutional, non-compliance, and that is the trap we are in.”
His fear is that Kenya is operating outside its own constitutional order, exposing the next election to legal invalidation regardless of political goodwill.
Compounding this is the census crisis. Court decisions nullifying population data in Wajir, Mandera, and Garissa, followed by orders for a mini-census in 2026, have created what Mudavadi calls a legal dead end.
“Mixing 2019 census data with 2026 census data is a legal impossibility,” he said.
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The fear here is technical but profound: without a single, uniform population dataset, boundary review cannot occur, and without boundary review, elections cannot legally proceed.
Mudavadi also expresses concern about structural contradictions within the Constitution itself. Article 89(4) limits constituencies to 290, while population growth demands greater representation.
At the same time, county-level laws cap wards at 1,450, conflicting with constitutional provisions that allow the IEBC to alter ward boundaries.
His fear is that even a properly conducted boundary review could trigger litigation from communities that either lose constituencies or feel underrepresented.
In this context, elections become a legal minefield.
Politically, Mudavadi’s warning reflects fear of instability. A nullified election would not merely be a legal event; it would trigger economic uncertainty, institutional paralysis, and public unrest. His language—a looming constitutional storm”—suggests concern about national cohesion if legitimacy of leadership is questioned before voting even begins.
Importantly, Mudavadi’s fear is not isolationist.
By linking the referendum to the implementation of the NADCO report, he signals that elite consensus may be the only path out of the crisis.
This suggests apprehension that without bipartisan agreement, constitutional reform could itself become a divisive political contest, worsening the crisis it seeks to solve.
Ultimately, Mudavadi’s message is one of preventive alarm.
He is not predicting electoral failure; he is warning of its probability if current conditions persist.
His repeated emphasis on law, timelines, and court rulings reflects fear of a state trapped by its own constitutional architecture.
As 2027 approaches, his warning reframes the political debate from who will win the election to whether the election can legally survive at all.
