The ploy is intricate and clever. The plot is well mapped. The strategy is assumed to be airtight. But the execution appears unrefined, even amateurish. That’s perplexing because the deferral ploy has been under consideration by the merchants of impunity for at least one year.
Most of the strategy sessions have been held in government facilities, private homes and even within the precincts of one prominent seat of power. The authority to proceed with the ploy is blatantly unconstitutional and immoral. The Vice President has claimed that the authority came from the President himself.
However, it is important to underline, like Hons. Musalia Mudavadi and Mutula Kilonzo have done, that the deferral campaign was never discussed and approved by cabinet.
More than a dozen exorbitantly rewarded lawyers, including one being touted as a potential Chief Justice, plus numerous self-appointed policy wonks and tribal strategists have been meeting weekly to fine-tune the plan. The big hitters on the PNU side of the coalition are elated by it.
Although the VP has been given the skunk to carry around Africa, this is a belated assignment. Initially, he wasn’t even supposed to know about the plan. He isn’t trusted well enough by the KKK inner circle. But after patriotic Kenyans smoked them out, the conspirators rethought their strategy and roped in the ever opportunistic presidential pretender. Now, for all practical purposes, the dirty skunk is his and he has been running around Africa with it around his neck.
For the deferral campaigners, it is immaterial what the constitution says. They were never for this constitution anyway. They have never supported devolution, the entrenchment of the bill of rights, the separation of powers, integrity, transparency and accountability in governance. These egalitarian principles and practices are designed to check the excessive powers the merchants of impunity have abused over the years.
The idea that public land and wealth will no longer be easily and fraudulently converted into private property isn’t something that Kenyans should have expected the merchants of impunity to accept and they haven’t.
The merchants of impunity don’t respect the public interest. Nor do they care about public good. To them, the victims of the post election violence either deserved what they got or they were collateral damages. For them, power and ill gotten wealth trump human life. That’s why they’ve run down the country for the past fifty years. They know and respect nothing else. During the constitutional referendum, Kenyans called these merchants of impunity “the red brigade” and “watermelons.” Now they have united under the KKK ethnic jingoistic banner.
They want to subvert the implementation of the constitution to perpetuate impunity. Dubiously, they argue that stability, security and peace override justice. But the four principles must go together in a democratic system. Without justice, peace and security are meaningless. There is no reason why it must either be stability, peace and security or justice. Moreover, it’s the public that should determine when or if one principle may be tempered due to certain exigencies.
The marauding armed and organized gangs that perpetrated the mass killings, maiming, rapes, torture and displacements caused maximum insecurity, instability and injustice. The prevailing situation during the period under examination by the ICC wasn’t peaceful; it was replete with chaos, flagrant human rights abuses and barbarism inflicted on innocent Kenyans.
Do the merchants of impunity now squandering our money on useless trips around Africa know the spelling and meaning of peace, stability and security? Why didn’t they guarantee stability, security and peace to the hundreds of thousands of innocent victims?
But here is the big deal. The merchants of impunity and ethnic jingoists aren’t really interested in the deferral of the case facing the Ocampo Six. They know that the UN Security Council will not accede to their request even if coated in chocolate and gold.
The Security Council has never done so under similar circumstances. The UN Security Council has no jurisdiction over active cases before the ICC. The Pre-Trial Chamber is now fully seized of the Kenyan Situation. The Security Council isn’t an organ of the ICC. Even if it was, it wouldn’t have the power to recall a case before the judges.
Proper administration of justice requires the independence, impartiality and integrity of the court and judges. A deferral under the circumstances would be deemed as interference by the Security Council in the operation of the ICC. When that occurs, the anti-ICC advocates would find “reason” to call the court “imperialist.”
The merchants of impunity are only interested in an AU resolution supporting the deferral of the cases facing the Ocampo Six. They intend to use the resolution as an excuse for not cooperating with Moreno-Ocampo if or when he obtains arrest warrants against the six.
The idea is to obtain an AU resolution and use it as the basis for refusing to execute the ICC arrest warrants and hand over the six indictees purportedly in deference to the AU. That’s the argument they used when refusing to arrest Al-Bashir in Nairobi, going as far as demonstrating their disregard of the new Constitution and Kenya’s international obligations by inviting an international fugitive to the constitutional inauguration.
Once they obtain the AU resolution, the merchants of impunity would escalate the implementation of their 2012 schemes in concert with and for the KKK tribalists.
Soon, cases facing some of the KKK members will “disappear” from the courts. That explains the unconstitutional reappointment of Gichangi as the Director General of the NSIS. The abrogation of the constitution may continue with all the pending constitutional appointments.
Ultimately, the plan is to render the new Constitution useless and revert to the old system they are used to. The idea is to turn Kenya into a true banana republic. We must never allow that to happen.
Miguna is the PM’s advisor on Coalition Affairs. The views expressed here are his own.
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