Kalonzo joins PNU in attacking ICC

By Job Weru and Beatrice Obwocha

The International Criminal Court (ICC) is now deeply muddled in local party and ethnicity politics as its investigators collect evidence against key perpetrators of the 2007 post-election violence.

Doubts are now emerging over the Government’s full commitment to work with the ICC despite its repeated promises that it would fully co-operate. Barely 24 hours after Central Kenya MPs alleged that the ICC was targeting a community from the region, Vice-President Kalonzo Musyoka came with more shocking claims against the court.

Speaking at the close of a two-day ODM-Kenya party conference for Central delegates in Nyeri, the VP said the PNU wing of government would not allow a biased probe.

“We will not allow a process that will cause more deaths,” warned Kalonzo, without elaborating.

Put into context, it appears Kalonzo was suggesting the Government would not allow ICC to use evidence that was unacceptable to it.

The heat being generated by the ICC case makes it unlikely that it is going to be a smooth ride to indict top politicians and businessmen targeted by Prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo.

Last week, key Government officials refused to release crucial information on the deployment of police forces in Nairobi, Rift Valley, Nyanza and Western provinces prior, during and in the immediate period after the violence to the international court.

They instead said the National Security Intelligence Service (NSIS) and Attorney-General Amos Wako must first vet the information.

It also emerged that senior security officers were worried that the Government was using them as sacrificial lambs in the international probe.

Focus has in recent weeks shifted to Provincial Commissioners and Provincial Police Officers after ICC investigators requested to meet them.

On Saturday, Kalonzo accused the ICC of bias because it was allegedly targeting the PNU instead of dealing with the “real culprits”.

“Nobody is concerned with what happened to Kirathimo IDPs,” said the VP, who also cautioned that the process could cause more deaths.

On Friday, a PNU parliamentary group meeting warned that ICC was targeting one community from Central Kenya in the investigation.

New evidence

They were reacting to a UN report compiled by the Special Adviser on Prevention of Genocide (see pages 4-5) during the violence, which the ICC will allegedly submit as part of its evidence when the case begins next year.

Central Kenya MPs said they would not accept the adoption of the report because the ICC was allegedly targeting Central Province leaders.

The MPs vowed to resist the “political motives” behind the alleged scheme, including “taking the matter to Parliament” because “we are not seeing justice” for post-election violence suspects if the probe proceeded in that manner.

But on Saturday, Kalonzo said it was his entry into a coalition with President Kibaki — who was hurriedly sworn in after the bungled Presidential election results were announced by former Electoral Commission chairman Samuel Kivuitu, triggering the chaos — that helped save Kenya from more violence. “If it were not for Wiper (Kalonzo), Kenya would be something else,” he said.

Kalonzo claimed that rigging took place throughout the country, especially in the Rift Valley where “confusion” over his ODM-Kenya party and ODM names led him to lose votes. “I had overwhelming support in the Rift Valley, but my votes were rigged. My supporters were confused and this led to loss of so many votes,” he said.

The ICC case will be a big determinant of post-Kibaki coalitions, and this was not lost to the Mwingi MP who reiterated that a coalition between himself, Deputy Prime Minister Uhuru Kenyatta and Prof George Saitoti was in the works.

“We and other like-minded leaders are engaged in consultations that would lead to the formation of a grand party that would field a presidential candidate in 2012,” said Kalonzo.

The ICC has faced many hurdles in its quest for justice over the violence.

For one, the Government failed to establish a local tribunal to try suspects of the post-election violence.

Last month, Justice Minister Mutula Kilonzo stirred the hornet’s nest when he claimed that The Hague option was no longer necessary because the country can now adequately handle the cases following the passage of the new Constitution. He, however, later clarified that he had been quoted out of context.

Elsewhere in the Rift Valley, political and church leaders on Saturday called for alternative ways to settle the post-election violence issue.

They asked ICC prosecutor Ocampo not to rush the process and end up dividing the country.

Settling disputes

Eldama Ravine MP Moses Lessonet said panic had gripped some leaders over the international court’s modus operandi, despite their having supported it in Parliament.

“Some people have become afraid and what we need now is an out-of-ICC settlement,” he said, adding that local means of settling disputes by involving elders and through forgiveness should be considered.

He was speaking during the burial of the late Zakayo Bomet in Poror area in Koibatek.

Kanu’s First National Vice-Chairman Gideon Moi and his sister, Jennifer Moi, were in attendance.

The Rev Jackson Kosgey on his part urged Ocampo not to rush the investigations.

“Ocampo asiharakishe wakenya kisha aharibu nchi badala ya kuitengeza (Ocampo should not rush Kenyans and end up destroying the nation rather than restore it),” he said.

He accused some leaders of targeting a community in the Rift Valley on issues of ICC and corruption, and took issue with the use of the word ‘Kalenjin Warriors’ in the Waki Report saying it painted a whole community in bad light.

“The Mungiki is from Central Province and they were not named the Kikuyu Mungiki, same for Chinkororo from Kisii and other groups,” he said.

He urged Kalenjin MPs to push for the word to be expunged failure to which lawyers should take it up.

He said politicians should stop mudslinging each other and instead show respect irrespective of the communities they hailed from.