Saturday, December 18, 2010

ICC legal fees will cost suspects a fortune


File |  NATION The International Criminal Court building at The Hague. Assembling a team of lawyers to defend suspects at The Hague requires a lot of financial muscle
File | NATION The International Criminal Court building at The Hague. Assembling a team of lawyers to defend suspects at The Hague requires a lot of financial muscle  
By SAMWEL KUMBA skumba@ke.nationmedia.comPosted Friday, December 17 2010 at 21:00
In Summary
  • Suspects need very deep pockets as ICC requires them to pay for their defence

The six Kenyans named on Wednesday by International Criminal Court chief prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo as post-election violence suspects should be prepared to dig deep into their pockets for legal costs.
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The court has indicated that they should shoulder their expenses.
Calculations by Saturday Nation show that between Sh500,000 to Sh1 million is needed daily to hire a legal team that can match the prosecutor’s highly experienced one.
The legal team can be chosen from a list of lawyers accredited by the special court, which has only nine from Kenya.
The six suspects are deputy Prime Minister and minister for Finance Uhuru Kenyatta, Industrialisation minister Henry Kosgey, suspended Higher Education minister William Ruto, post-master general Hussein Ali, Secretary to the Cabinet Francis Muthaura and journalist Joshua Arap Sang.
Chairman of the Law Society of Kenya, Mr Kenneth Akide says most of those named have the financial muscle to assemble a good defence.
“Except for Sang, the others seem to be people who can finance a good defence. Moreno-Ocampo has described them as ‘big fish’ or ‘organisers’. They could have deep pockets,” he said.
Former LSK chairman Okong’o O’Mogeni also had no doubts about the size of the legal bills.
“Most will prefer to deal with their own lawyers whose recognition they can request from the special court as there are no stringent laws on accreditation,” he said.
Kenyan lawyers accredited by the ICC are Prof Githu Muigai, Mr Mbuthi Gathenji, Mr Arthur Igeria, Mr Wilfred Nderitu, Mr Boniface Njiru, Mr Kennedy Ogetto, Albert Kamunde, Ms Mary Wambui Njogu and Ms Chana Sureta.
Although the ICC is obliged to provide accused persons with a lawyer, this is usually not enough as one would like to assemble a team complete with research assistants.
To defend a high profile criminal case in Kenya costs anything between Sh40,000 to Sh80,000 a day. The ICC lawyers will charge about the same, with the assistants taking home half that.
The prosecutor and his investigators have been interviewing witnesses and collecting evidence for some time. They also have the advantage of having reviewed reports like those prepared by Justice Philip Waki-led Commission and Kenya National Commission on Human Rights.
“A defence team will therefore need to bring together legal minds to match the ICC team. Having a translator or a bilingual person on board will be an added advantage,” said Mr Akide.
The LSK chairman said such high profile cases will also need a team to handle publicity.
“Essentially, what goes on at the ICC is a mixture of a lot of politics and very limited legal merits. That is why all the suspects must have a formidable publicity machinery to balance the public relations and political equations,” he said.
This is because every time there is a hearing, journalists will want to know what is happening quickly and someone has to share with them updates of the case’s progress.
This can cost nearly Sh40,000 a day if one hires a publicity firm.
Accommodation at The Hague is not cheap and rooms at most hotels range from Sh11,336 to Sh28,600 (Euro 275) in three-star and five-star hotels.

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