The court held that the constitutional and statutory requirements for eligibility as an independent candidate are clear and mandatory: a candidate must not have been a member of a political party for at least three months prior to the election. The petitioner resigned from the Orange Democratic Movement on 8th May 2017, which was less than ninety days before the 8th August 2017 general elections. There was no evidence that the party notified the Registrar of the resignation as required by law, and thus the petitioner's name had not been removed from the party membership list. The court found that it could not compel the second respondent (IEBC) to receive and gazette the petitioner's name and symbol as an independent candidate outside the stipulated period, as doing so would contravene Article 85(a) of the Constitution and section 33(1) of the Elections Act. The timelines are peremptory and non-negotiable, and the court cannot issue orders that would violate clear constitutional and statutory provisions. The petition was therefore dismissed as lacking merit.