Photo/FILE Eldoret North MP William Ruto (left) and his counterpart Eugene Wamalwa (Saboti) watch a football match in Kakamega.
By MUGUMO MUNENE mmunene@ke.nationmedia.com
Posted Saturday, April 7 2012 at 22:30
Posted Saturday, April 7 2012 at 22:30
IN SUMMARY
- New minister is walking in big shoes, having landed a docket that has traditionally been held by political heavyweights who have all left without ceremony
Like an adult learning to walk in middle age, Saboti MP Eugene Wamalwa is still finding his feet after he was flung from the backbench on to the hot seat in one presidential swoop.
At least, that’s the way it appeared when he began his first press conference by fighting off allegations that he was a G7 stooge brought in to lower temperatures on the International Criminal Court (ICC). The Hague process was not really his business, he told journalists.
For starters, Mr Wamalwa is walking in big shoes, having landed a docket that has traditionally been held by political heavyweights who have all left that office without ceremony and almost given it a jinxed tag.
First there was Tom Mboya, the man who was widely thought to be a capable successor of founder President Jomo Kenyatta until he was assassinated in 1969.
His successor was Mr Charles Mugane Njonjo, Kenya’s first and powerful AG who resigned from the State Law Office and joined elective politics in 1979. President Moi appointed him to the Justice and Constitutional Affairs docket.
After Mr Njonjo’s tenure, the duties were transferred to the AG for 20 years of the Moi administration. It was President Kibaki who pulled the position from the doldrums in 2002 in his first term, handing it to his close political ally of many years, Mr Kiraitu Murungi.
Mr Murungi’s efforts at a constitutional overhaul failed in November 2005 after Kenyans rejected the government draft at a referendum.
He was transferred to the Energy docket two months later.Exit Mr Murungi and enter the straight- shooting Ms Martha Karua, an erstwhile political ally and defender-in-chief of the Kibaki administration who has since moved on to pursue her own presidential ambition.
She ran the docket through the campaigns for the 2007 General Election and was widely seen as a hawkish member of the Kibaki Cabinet because of her strong positions, especially over the appointment of electoral commissioners close to the elections.
Always seen as a Kibaki insider, Ms Karua quit in frustration in 2009 complaining that her hands were tied. She gave way for the transfer of Mr Mutula Kilonzo from the rather lowly Nairobi Metropolitan ministry to the more visible Justice docket.
Mr Kilonzo promised to be a stickler for the law. Fate favoured him as he will go down in history as the Justice minister who was a key player in midwifing the country’s new Constitution.
Mr Kilonzo prided himself in his knowledge of the law and often said that he would stick to the law only and not the politics of the day in discharging the mandate of his office.
He often told journalists that he was comfortable as long as President Kibaki was happy with his job.
Then came the ICC storm that swept him away. Mr Kilonzo often caused great discomfort to ICC suspects – and especially Mr Uhuru Kenyatta and Mr William Ruto – over his public advice that they should forego their quests for the presidency.
“You cannot be accused of crimes against humanity and seek to lead the same humanity,” Mr Kilonzo often said, putting him at odds with Mr Kenyatta, Mr Ruto and their powerful political retinues.
At one point, Mr Kilonzo’s position that Mr Kenyatta and former Civil Service chief Francis Muthaura must relinquish their positions upon confirmation of charges led to a round of heavy rumours in the corridors of power and the political elite that the then Justice minister would be fired.
Mr Kilonzo, who comes from the same party as Vice-President Kalonzo Musyoka, attracted disquiet in the G7 alliance over the true intentions of their Wiper Democratic Movement.
A wedge that was publicly displayed to the chagrin of the VP developed as some lieutenants and court poets in the G7 alliance called for Mr Kilonzo’s sacking.
The political spat died down, but it would appear that those uncomfortable with Mr Kilonzo’s continued stay at the Justice ministry, a docket that lent a lot of weight to his comments on ICC matters, did not go to sleep.
He was ejected last week and moved to the Education ministry, a deep-end challenge for a man who reeks of the law and has spent all of his adult life in the legal profession, save for the two-year stint as the Nairobi Metropolitan minister.
Prayer rallies
The choice of Mr Wamalwa to replace Mr Kilonzo was not entirely a surprise. He has been at the G7 forefront attending and even hosting the political rallies that Mr Kenyatta and Mr Ruto like to call “prayer rallies”.
After he took office, he pledged fidelity to the law and said that his political affiliations would not cloud his judgment. Mr Wamalwa, who has practised law for 17 years, took light note of the storms that have driven out his predecessors.
“I’m going to break the jinx,” he said, and laughed uproariously.
Humour aside, it was clear from the start of his first full-fledged news conference at his ministry’s Co-operative House boardroom that he started off on an uneasy footing.
“Since my appointment there has been a perception that I was appointed to protect certain individuals. Nothing could be further from the truth,” said the minister in his opening sentence.
“There’s a perception that has been created that I’m here because of the ICC. It’s an illusion.”
The events leading to his appointment could not have helped the perception Mr Wamalwa now has to fight.
On March 6, 2012, Mr Wamalwa sought a ministerial statement from the Foreign Affairs ministry. In his inquiry, he accused British Foreign Secretary William Hague of making statements that infringed on Kenya’s sovereignty and the right of voters to elect a President of their choice. He was echoing a G7 political statement.
Gross interference
He said that Mr Hague’s statement during his February visit to Kenya was a culmination of a campaign to undermine Kenya’s independence and interfere with the next General Election.
“Could the minister inform the House what steps he is taking to ensure that such gross interference in the domestic affairs of our country by a foreign country are curtailed and how we can ensure and maintain the sovereignty of the Kenyan people?”
And when then Foreign Affairs minister Moses Wetang’ula rose to deny the allegations, a can of worms popped open.
MPs Charles Kilonzo (Yatta) and Boni Khalwale (Ikolomani) read from a controversial document to support Mr Wamalwa’s claims, further alleging that Britain was behind efforts to investigate President Kibaki over the post-election violence.
Using the document, which Britain has since disowned, MPs also sensationally claimed that Britain is working in cahoots with Prime Minister Raila Odinga to have Mr Kenyatta and Mr Ruto detained by the ICC for using their so-called prayer rallies to fuel incitement.
The credibility of the document is now the subject of an inquiry by the House committee on Defence and Foreign Affairs. Mr Wamalwa has been a member of that committee but had to relinguish his membership upon being appointed minister.
And his appointment to the Justice ministry, less than three weeks after the release of the controversial document, has raised eyebrows and set tongues wagging.
When asked about whether his friends should still run for the presidency, Mr Wamalwa said that he could only go by the law and that Kenyans have to wait for the Bill that is supposed to give impetus to the broad powers of Chapter Six of the Constitution that deals with ethics and integrity.
“Let’s follow the law without necessarily raising political temperatures,” he said and avoided cast-in-stone commitments. His predecessor was categorical that defendants of crimes against humanity cannot run for public office.
LSK chairman Eric Mutua is opposed to Mr Wamalwa’s position.
“As a lawyer, he has the ability if he wants to deliver. As MP, he is qualified. Our concern is the position he is taking on the issue of the ICC saying that it’s not in his docket. For me, he is playing politics,” Mr Mutua said.
Political calculation
But Senior Counsel Paul Muite said that Mr Wamalwa had made a smart political calculation by choosing to keep away from the ICC issues.
“From a political perspective, it is a smart move on his part. He’s too much identified with the G7. He should keep his mouth shut about ICC. Legally, what he says is the right position. It is an issue for the AG and the Internal Security minister,” Mr Muite said.
But he defended Mr Kilonzo’s position on the ICC, the suspects and public office. “At the individual level, his predecessor was right on the position of the law. However, having made his decision not to wade into the ICC matters, Mr Wamalwa should not demonise his predecessor.”
In warding off the perceptions that he would be biased, Mr Wamalwa laid out his mandate as broadly including legal policy, administration of justice; constitutional affairs, anti-corruption strategies, integrity and ethics; legal education, political parties, legal aid, elections, national cohesion, human rights and reconciliation.
He was unequivocal – and quoted Section 2 of the International Crimes Act for backup – that matters touching on the ICC would not be his core business. Such matters belong to the Internal Security minister George Saitoti and Attorney-General Githu Muigai, he said.
“My predecessor was acting in error. He was usurping the powers of those two ministries which, by law, are the principals on this matter. Ours is an advisory role. He was overzealous,” Mr Wamalwa told the Sunday Nation in an interview after his news conference.
Although he didn’t appear to have any immediate plans to form a local tribunal, it now happens that he holds the key that could unlock the desire by Mr Ruto and Mr Kenyatta for local trials.
An attempt by the government to have the trials set in Nairobi failed on the account that there was no credible local process that met international standards to which the ICC would want to cede the cases.
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