Dispute over who had the power to read the results

According to the Supreme Court, the commission, not the chairperson, is in charge of verifying and tallying the results of the presidential election. In past court rulings, the chairman cannot assume exclusive authority over the verification and tally of the results.

However, the judges were aware that the four commissioners who had contested the final results had participated in earlier results verification and tallying.

The chief justice claims that the four commissioners failed to provide any evidence that the outcome was tainted and failed to explain their participation in a verification procedure that they later claimed was "opaque."

But the judges are critical of the governance of the electoral commission which could produce such a split.

However, this was not enough to nullify the outcome of the poll, the chief justice concludes in this section.