To eliminate insecurity, we must not be tempted to take unlawful decisions

President Uhuru Kenyatta addresses a mammoth crowd at a past event. Photo\PSCU 

In Summary

• Indeed, his decision to contest the presidency, and his election to that position, clearly helped the charges go away. So why should not others try to emulate him? This smacks of the classic hypocrite’s — and dictators-- mantra of “do as I say, not as I do.”
• It is noteworthy that neither William Ruto nor Ahmed Isaack Hassan of IEBC is on the list. The argument — also used in trying to distinguish Mr Kenyatta’s case —that their charges are criminal and political is spurious.
• Corruption is criminal, and even then not at the level of crimes against humanity. And it must be fought constitutionally. If we want to eliminate terrorism and corruption, we must avoid unconstitutional power grabs, hypocrisy and selectivity.

By Maina Kiai
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First my sincere condolences to the families and friends of the 147 people killed in the terrorist attack in Garissa.

The scale of this attack is a warning that we are not out of the woods yet and that we all must do our part to eradicate terrorism in our midst.

But dealing with terrorism must and should be part of the war on corruption and impunity. There is no doubt that our messes are all linked up.

Corruption not only greases the engine of terrorists, it also creates anger, frustrations and a sense of marginalisation that then perpetuates terrorists’ recruitment and attacks.

And the way we handle terrorism can either put us at more risk, or make us safer. We must resist the colonial era approach of community punishments that we used in the aftermath of Westgate and other attacks.

That is why it is great that Uhuru Kenyatta has finally decided to act on corruption after years of rhetoric. We welcome this action.

But, and yes a big but, he needs to conduct this new found commitment against corruption in a way that does not undermine us all and boomerang.

He needs to steer away from the anti-people and anti-constitutional approach of the Security laws, and the colonial blanket community punishments.

ACCUMULATE POWER

The biggest concern with this new anti-corruption approach, and now also after the Garissa attacks, is Mr Kenyatta’s impulse to accumulate total power in his office and in his person.

He has announced he will ignore a court order on recruitment of 10,000 new police officers, halted because of corruption. By ordering their illegal recruitment, he is undermining his own anti-corruption crusade! And it makes our efforts to combat terrorism harder: For if people pay to become police officers and soldiers, how can then take the necessary risks to combat terrorism or corruption?

We have seen how the previously exalted Nigerian army became hollowed out by similar corruption. So much so that the government had to hire mercenaries to combat Boko Haram, precisely because these days people pay to join the military!

And again we see this effort to unconstitutionally accumulate power with the demand that elected public officers who are not accountable to him step aside as they are investigated on corruption charges.

It is fine and proper to demand that appointee’s step aside, but for elected officials, the process must be different. And that process must include charges in court, rather than what could be politically motivated charges.

This illegal accumulation of power is exactly what Jomo Kenyatta did (successfully) in the early years of independence when he decided to impose a state of emergency in the Northern Frontier Districts, against the legal advice of the Attorney General who told him that this was unconstitutional.

HYPOCRISY

And that was the beginning of the Imperial Presidency that hurt this country so much in so many ways including perpetuating corruption and the culture of impunity.

And of course, the hypocrisy in demanding that elected leaders step aside as they are being investigated must not be lost on us. Uhuru Kenyatta not only refused to relinquish his Deputy Prime Minister position despite being charged — not just investigated — on the gravest crimes possible.

Indeed, his decision to contest the presidency, and his election to that position, clearly helped the charges go away. So why should not others try to emulate him? This smacks of the classic hypocrite’s — and dictators-- mantra of “do as I say, not as I do.”

It is noteworthy that neither William Ruto nor Ahmed Isaack Hassan of IEBC is on the list. The argument — also used in trying to distinguish Mr Kenyatta’s case —that their charges are criminal and political is spurious.

How good it is that Kithure Kindiki is no longer teaching law, given his attempts at intellectual gymnastics on this issue.

Corruption is criminal, and even then not at the level of crimes against humanity. And it must be fought constitutionally. If we want to eliminate terrorism and corruption, we must avoid unconstitutional power grabs, hypocrisy and selectivity.

mkiai2000@yahoo.com