By OTIENO OTIENO

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Kenya’s Supreme Court is yet to decide the fate of the country’s stalled constitutional reforms bid two months after the conclusion of hearings, fuelling speculation about what is seen as one of the few major cards still available for the leading presidential hopefuls to play in the race to succeed President Uhuru Kenyatta.

The Supreme Court judges heard the petition seeking to revive the government-backed reforms, popularly known as the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI), between January 18 and 20 but did not indicate when they would give the judgment.

BBI sought to, among others, change the Constitution to create additional positions in government such as those of prime minister and two deputy prime ministers to presumably accommodate more of the country’s political elite in power.

President Kenyatta and his preferred successor Raila Odinga, the co-architects of BBI, see an expanded government addressing the weaknesses of the current winner-take-all system that has been linked to ethnic violence in past elections. The High Court and the Court of Appeal in May and August last year declared the process used in proposing constitutional amendments illegal, blocking a planned referendum.

But President Kenyatta and Mr Odinga, who spearheaded the BBI campaign, have in the past sought to reassure their supporters that BBI would return in one form or the other.

The long-awaited Supreme Court judgment is thought to be especially consequential for the August 9 election as it would — whatever the outcome — determine the kind of pre-election and post-election power-sharing deals that will emerge from ongoing negotiations, who the presidential candidates eventually choose as running mates and further political realignments in the next four and a half months.

Although Mr Odinga and Deputy President William Ruto, the two front runners in the race to succeed President Kenyatta, have each pulled off significant coalition deals recently, they continue to face tough questions about from their new allies how they will share out power

Former vice-president Kalonzo Musyoka, who last week finally agreed to back Mr Odinga’s presidential bid after seven months of topsy-turvy negotiations led by President Kenyatta, has in recent days publicly raised concerns about the terms of the agreements his party and others signed to join the Azimio La Umoja coalition.

Mr Musyoka, currently President Kenyatta’s Special Envoy to South Sudan, also indicated he had yet to get over his sense of grievance against the former prime minister for allegedly backtracking on an agreement to support his presidential bid in this year’s election.

The two leaders have contested the past two elections on a joint ticket, with Mr Musyoka as running mate, but fell out over the disputed MoU and sharing of State funds allocated to political parties. His decision to endorse Mr Odinga is widely attributed to the intervention of President Kenyatta, who has long viewed Mr Musyoka as a key plank of his succession plan.

He retains political influence in the Lower Eastern region, where a majority of the elected 19 Members of Parliament affiliated to his Wiper Democratic Movement party come from.

Wiper, as the party is popularly known, also has pockets of support in Nairobi and the Coast among members of Mr Musyoka’s Kamba ethnic community.