KEGORO: The ideological divide in looming law society polls

Law Society of Kenya representative to the Judicial Service Commission lawyer Ahmednasir Abdullahi. PHOTO/FILE 

In Summary

• The occasion for the present interest has been the two sets of elections whose campaigns the society is currently going through.
• The appointment of Weda to the tribunal cast him as an insider in the establishment, as this was thought to be the common denominator shared by the appointees. 

By George Kegoro
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The wheel has turned full circle at the Law Society of Kenya (LSK), with the political establishment showing the same kind of interest in the internal affairs of the society as it did at the height of one-party rule.

Also, as a blast from the past, a similar ideological divide that was evident among the membership of LSK has re-emerged, pitting conservatives against progressives.

The occasion for the present interest has been the two sets of elections whose campaigns the society is currently going through. The first set of elections is to fill the vacancy of the LSK representative to the Judicial Service Commission (JSC) to replace lawyer Ahmednasir Abdullahi whose term expired last month.

Ahmednasir has offered himself for re-election to the commission, and is opposed by Tom Ojienda and Okong’o Omogeni. All three candidates for JSC are former LSK chairmen.

The elections, to be conducted by the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC), could have taken place last month when Ahmednasir’s term expired, but these were delayed to this year and have now coincided with the internal elections of the LSK council.

In the elections, the society will elect its leadership, including the chair. Eric Mutua, the outgoing chairman who has done an outstanding job, is offering himself for re-election and is facing opposition from two members of his LSK council: Ambrose Weda and Charles Kanjama.

Weda is associated with the ruling Jubilee coalition, whose leadership he has represented in court. Following the recommendation by the National Assembly for the removal of six members of the JSC, including Ahmednasir, Weda was appointed to serve as a member of the tribunal chaired by Justice Aaron Ringera.

The team was to look into the suitability of the six members to serve in office.

RELIGIOUS MAN

The appointment of Weda to the tribunal cast him as an insider in the establishment, as this was thought to be the common denominator shared by the appointees.

Not surprisingly, therefore, some may perceive Weda as the candidate leaning towards the establishment in these elections.

The third candidate, Charles Kanjama, is a deeply religious man with a strong ethical bearing. Recently, Kanjama used his column in a local newspaper to espouse his views about leadership at LSK, remarking that “now is the time for a renewed emphasis on the bread and butter issues that really matter to lawyers”.

In simple terms, Kanjama’s platform seeks to return the society back to the apolitical frame from which it has (presumably) drifted. Such a position may be viewed as a re-statement of the standpoint taken by the conservative wing in the society during the one-party era.

The conservatives at the time argued that the only role LSK should play is to represent the professional interests of its members — such as agitating for better remuneration.

They asserted that the society had no role in the struggles revolving around the rule of law, which characterised Kenya at that time

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They regarded involvement in such issues, including articulating the case for a resumption of multi-party politics, as amounting to the politicisation of the legal profession.

RESTARIN LSK FROM POLITICAL ACTIVITIES

The conservatives even sued the LSK Council in the High Court seeking orders to restrain the society from commenting on political issues and arguing that its only role was to address matters “germane to the practice of law”

While one such suit was successful, the enforcement of its orders proved difficult since an agreed definition of “politics”, which the court ordered the council to refrain from commenting on, proved difficult.

In the end, the judge said he did not need to define “politics” in his judgment since, as a group of senior lawyers, the LSK Council ought to know what politics was!

The same divide is evident in the elections for the representative of the society in the JSC. Ahmednasir has had a high-profile, if controversial, public life as LSK chairman, and also as chair of the Kenya Anti-Corruption Commission (now Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission) advisory board.

He also had a controversial first term as a member of the JSC. In the elections, he claims he is the anti-establishment candidate because of difficulties he had in the JSC, which culminated in his attempted removal.

Ojienda served as a member of the Truth Justice and Reconciliation Commission, whose report to President Uhuru Kenyatta was altered under unclear circumstances.

A section of the profession has asked that he should clear the air about that matter as he seeks to represent the society on the JSC.


Like Ahmednasir, the third candidate, Omogeni, served as chair of the KACC advisory board.

It is reported that, uncharacteristically, large sums of money have been spent in the campaign for the election of LSK’s representative to the JSC, defying a rational cost/benefit analysis.

The reported massive expenditure has lent credence to claims of external involvement in the elections. A specific candidate has been accused by others of spending big and is, for this reason, being portrayed as the candidate for the establishment.

At LSK, therefore, the more things have changed, the more they have remained the same. If, as alleged, there is an external attempt to influence who represents the society on the Judicial Service Commission (JSC), this ultimately is a major threat to the independence of the Judiciary, and should have us worried.

gkegoro@gmail.com