Suspend AG, PM Odinga told

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The civil society has asked Prime Minister Raila Odinga to suspend Attorney General Githu Muigai July 4, 2012. FILE  

By ALPHONCE SHIUNDU and LAILA MOHAMMED newsdesk@ke.nationmedia.com
Posted  Wednesday, July 4  2012 at  14:58

The civil society has asked Prime Minister Raila Odinga to suspend Attorney General Githu Muigai.

Speaking at a meeting with the PM to assess the struggle for reforms in Kenya, Cyprian Nyamwamu, the Chief Executive of the National Convention Executive Council, said the permanent secretary in the Ministry of Internal Security Mutea Iringo should also be shown the door for issuing a decree that was contrary to a court ruling.

He said, Mr Iringo’s assurance to county commissioners that they would be paid despite a court ruling revoking their appointments was an act of impunity.

The PS was banking on a successful appeal of the court ruling when he asked the county commissioners to stay put despite the court ruling.

“Who is he (Mutea Iringo) to overrule what the courts have said?” posed Mr Nyamwamu.

In the meeting at the Hilton Hotel in Nairobi, Mr Nyamwamu told the PM that it would be good if the AG was reprimanded for consistently “misadvising the government” into committing legal goofs many of which have been subject of litigation.

“Prof Muigai cannot keep misadvising government at every other turn…some of these things which you, Mr Prime Minister, tolerate in the coalition government make those of us who’ve been fighting for reforms very depressed. Suspend these people,” said Mr Nyamwamu.

Incompetence

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That said, the PM has no power to suspend those whom he doesn’t have the power to appoint. That remains the prerogative of the President. The PM can only ask the President to do so, and hope that President agrees with him. It is what is provided for under the National Accord, in the spirit of consultation. When he attempted to suspend ministers, the President overruled him.

The Police Commissioner too is on the crosshairs of the activists’ guns, because of what Mr Nyamwamu termed as his incompetence in the way he had handled the terror threat in the country, more so, against a backdrop of the massacre in Garissa in which 17 people were killed in an Al shabaab attack on two churches, last Sunday.

Gitobu Imanyara (Imenti Central MP) said Mr Iringo was acting with “impunity” and taking for granted the gains made as a result of promulgation of the new Constitution two years ago.

Mr Imanyara said the rejuvenated Judiciary that has been able to quash the unconstitutional decisions taken by the Executive was because the Judiciary had one of those who was in the reform movement back in the 1990s.

“The Judiciary is now under one of us. Let us celebrate (Chief Justice) Dr Willy Mutunga,” said Mr Imanyara.

But as the applause for the Chief Justice died down and the PM took the podium, he reminded the activists that they should remember that “before Dr Mutunga became Chief Justice, one had been appointed, and we resisted”.

The PM was referring to the controversial unilateral appointments that President Kibaki made appointing judge Alnashir Visram as Chief Justice. Both the Judiciary and Parliament rejected the appointments.

“It is true that a lot of gains have been made. What we need to do is to protect the Constitution,” said Mr Odinga.

Opposed to devolution

He said that in the next elections, Kenyans should be wary of those who were “homeguards in the colonial days” lest the dreams and hopes of the Constitution are scuttled. He said that there were already people opposed to devolution, and they would use any little opportunity that they get, to stifle its implementation.

“There are people who do not believe in devolution, and I know this because I talk to people,” said the Prime Minister.

He said, he was not ashamed to be in the coalition government, but quickly added that he was not one who’d easily forget his past.

“Yes, I am a Prime Minister. But I am not one who does not know his place in history. Running a coalition government is not easy, but up to today, given the circumstances, this is the best that we could get,” said Mr Odinga.

The next elections, the PM said, will determine if the implementation of the Constitution succeeds or if it will fail. He said that Kenyans should assess leaders based on their reform credentials, because, it is “the progressive mind that will implement progressive ideas".

Critics of those running for elective positions based on the reform and change platform, have been saying that talk is cheap, and that it was now time for action, and genuine development.

On Wednesday, Mr Odinga told the critics that the focus on the past in the journey to the future was crucial, because “it is the past which informs our future”.