The Court of Appeal has declined to suspend a High Court order requiring President William Ruto to reconstitute his Cabinet, The Standard reported on Monday. The order rests on Article 27(8) of the Constitution. The article bars any appointive public body from having more than two-thirds of its members of one gender.
According to The Standard, Ruto's 25-member Cabinet has seven women. The law requires at least nine, leaving the Cabinet two women short. The paper did not say exactly when the Court of Appeal ruled.
The case arose from a petition by Katiba Institute and others. On June 30, 2026, a three-judge High Court bench declared the Cabinet unconstitutional. The judges held that the gender rule was immediate, mandatory and enforceable. They gave the President 120 days to comply, and that period ended on October 28.
The Law Society of Kenya has said the Cabinet is illegal and its decisions are open to challenge, The Standard reported. In an editorial, the paper said further litigation, including contempt proceedings, was foreseeable. It argued that compliance needs no new legislation, because Cabinet appointments are within the President's own power. It called on Ruto to act now. The sources include no response from the President or State House.
The dispute over the two-thirds gender rule goes back more than a decade. In 2012, the Supreme Court said in an advisory opinion that the principle would be realised progressively. It set August 27, 2015, as the deadline for Parliament to pass enabling legislation. Parliament missed that date, and an extension to 2016 also lapsed.
Petitions followed, and the High Court ordered Parliament to act. In 2020, the Chief Justice advised the President to dissolve Parliament, but the High Court suspended that advice. This year, the High Court declined to dissolve Parliament on procedural grounds. It affirmed, however, that the obligation still stands.