Chief Justice David Maraga addresses the press outside the Supreme Court yesterday. [Elvis Ogina,Standard]
Nairobi
CJ follows his dismissal of Executive Order with a stinging rebuke of the president.
For the umpteenth time, Chief Justice David Maraga descended on
President Uhuru Kenyatta, accusing him of a litany of things among them
failure to appoint 41 judges and continued defiance of court orders.
In a bare knuckle address to the nation, Maraga declared that the
president is out of order for disobeying two court orders on the
appointment of 41 judges and for failing to reign in his Executive,
which continues to violate the rights of thousands of people.
Bad blood
According to the CJ, it is a mockery for the president and his
government to demand that citizens obey its laws when they disobey the
law themselves and exposing members of the public to suffering as a
result of the willful defiance of court orders.
“This disregard of court orders by the president is part of the pattern
by the Executive. I must remind the president that he swore to defend
the Constitution and the laws of Kenya, he must demonstrate his respect
for the law by complying with court orders,” said Maraga.
Maraga’s outburst is likely to renew his rivalry and bad blood with the
Executive, coming just a few days after he dismissed an Executive Order
released by President Kenyatta which sought to place the Judicial
Service Commission (JSC) under a State department.
The CJ had also repeatedly complained of being undermined by the government and even threatened to boycott some State functions.
But early in the year during the launch of the State of the Judiciary
Report, the president and CJ had a truce after bad blood thought to have
originated from the Supreme Court’s cancellation of Uhuru’s victory in
the 2017 elections.
But yesterday, a fuming Maraga accused the president of undermining the
Judiciary by refusing to appoint the judges and frustrating his efforts
to have a meeting to iron out their differences.
“The president knows that I have for a long time unsuccessfully sought
an appointment to discuss the issues, leaving me with no option but to
raise them in public. It will be a dereliction of my duty if I do not
raise the public agonies in my domain,” he said.
Failure by the president to appoint and swear in the 41 judges nominated
to the Court of Appeal, Environment and Land Court and the Employment
and Labour Relations Court, he said, is hurting the administration of
justice and members of the public who will have to wait longer for their
cases.
To demonstrate the gravity of the matter, the CJ said any person filing a
land case now will have to wait until 2022 for the case to heard given
that the Environment and Lands Court only has 33 judges against a case
backlog of 16,457.
Integrity issues
He added that the situation is worse at the Court of Appeal which has
only 15 judges against a caseload of 7,315, and the Employment Court
which has 12 judges against a caseload of 13,197.
“Shortage of judges and near paralysis of court operations has been
caused by President Kenyatta’s persistent refusal to swear the judges
despite two court orders requiring him to do so within 14 days,” said
Maraga.
Controversy over the appointment of the 41 judges begun in July last
year after the JSC recommended the names to the president for
appointment. Eleven of the judges were appointed to Court of Appeal, 20
to the lands court and 10 to the employment court.
President Kenyatta, however, rejected the nominees on grounds that some
of them had questionable integrity issues. In February, High Court
Judges Lydiah Achode, James Makau and Chacha Mwita declared that the
president has no power to reject the names and ordered that he appoints
and swears in the judges within 14 days.
Maraga said the president’s reasons for rejecting the names over
integrity issues were dismissed by the High Court and that the continued
defiance of the court order is an act of impunity.
The CJ took a swipe at the government for neglecting to settle dozens of
court decrees amounting to over Sh1 billion, stating that some of the
victims have suffered paraplegic injuries in the hands of the State. He
also cited the eviction of thousands of people from disputed land in
Kariobangi North despite a court order stopping the ejection, stating
that it was immoral for the Government to subject the citizens to
suffering and exposing them to coronavirus.
“Attempts to compel State agencies to comply with the orders are always
rebuffed with the contemptuous ‘uta do’ attitude. How can we expect God
to bless our nation when we are so callous to the most desperate in our
society,” said Maraga.
CJ follows his dismissal of Executive Order with a stinging rebuke of the president.
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