The Supreme Court has dismissed a petition filed by opposition parties to delay the general elections.

In January, an alliance of 18 opposition political parties filed the petition.

They sued the Election Commission when it had scheduled the polls for June this year.

They wanted the court to order the commission to delay the general elections until peace is achieved. The commission has postponed the elections and has not set a new date.

In a ruling issued today, the Supreme Court said there is no case because the commission has already postponed the polls.

“The nullification of the declaration of 31^st December 2014 by being rendered absolute and void by the amendment of the constitution to extend the tenure of elected bodies for three years has robbed the constitutional suit of its course of action,” said Chan Reec Madut, Chief Justice.

“It followed that this petition should be dismissed with cause. There is no necessity to tackle sub-substantive issues.”

The election commission has welcomed the ruling.

Professor Abednego Akok, chairman, said:

“The court is the final authority to see to it that the act which has been passed and the constitution are protracted. So the decision has been done by them and we are to continue with stakeholders because we as the commission have no doubt we ought to cooperate with the political parties.”

However, the alliance of political parties disagrees with the basis of the court decision.

They say the elections should have been postponed by the court, but not the government or the election commission.

“The ruling as far as we are concerned, of course, the constitution says the ruling is binding. It is binding on us, but we think it is wrong,” said Dr Lam Akol, chairman of the SPLM-DC, one of the parties that filed the petition.

The commission postponed the polls after the parliament amended the transitional constitution and extended the term of office for the president until 2018.