I would never have given letter to the CJ credibility had he not believed it

By MUTUMA MATHIU   ( email the author)

Posted  Thursday, February 21  2013 at  19:26

In Summary

• I think Dr Willy Mutunga, the Chief Justice and President of the Supreme Court, is the man more Kenyans trust than anyone else.
• What kind of power, what kind of wealth, what is worth flushing a whole country down the toilet for?
• My own gut sense is that we are heading for a serious election and constitutional crisis unless, first, we defuse the tension which is building up, and, secondly, we stop these statements which are bringing the tensions in the first place.
• We have spent those 10 years dissecting his weaknesses and beating him for his failures, rarely talking about his strengths as a leader.

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Welcome to the 10 most difficult and anxious days in your life in five years.

It never used to be like this. An  election period was never one for sending the children upcountry,  stocking up on canned food and thinking about moving closer to the office.

Such is our reality today.

And such is the mismanagement of our politics that no one can really tell you whether the country will be safe come March 5, 2013, or not.

I expected drama, theatrics, stunts, grand standing and all other things that one would expect in a desperate but closely fought election.

But even I, a veteran of many elections, was not quite prepared for what we have seen this week.

I think Dr Willy Mutunga, the Chief Justice and President of the Supreme Court, is the man more Kenyans trust than anyone else.

He has tremendous credibility and patriotism.

In my own calculations, it is to Dr Mutunga I thought the country would to turn to play the honest arbiter if the politicians messed up the electoral process.

It is Dr Mutunga who gives credibility to some of the allegations flying around; we believe them because he told us so.

There has been a lot of debate about the so-called Mungiki letter which has been online and making the rounds in newsrooms for some time.

I would never have treated that document as authentic but I am giving it the benefit of the doubt because Dr Mutunga took it seriously in his statement.

I believe that as a the chief justice, he has information that I don’t, and as a judge, he has weighed the evidence and ruled that it be taken seriously.

I am happy with that.

So, can the executive stop mistreating our chief justice at the airport?

Can he get an assurance from OP and from the oily Mr Otieno Kajwang’ that he will not be harassed ever again?

Secondly, Kenya has significant security resources.

It has a military, it has VIP protection assets.

Let these resources be placed at the disposal of the Chief Justice for so long as he needs them.

And then let us have a proper, multi-agency investigation into this whole thing.

Let us find out the truth, the guys responsible for it, and let us make sure they don’t do it again.

My own gut sense is that we are heading for a serious election and constitutional crisis unless, first, we defuse the tension which is building up, and, secondly, we stop these statements which are bringing the tensions in the first place.

In 2007, politicians questioned the integrity and credibility of the electoral process, perhaps with good reason.

Those interfering with the electoral process and those making the electoral process a campaign issue, are having the same effect.

Let us make our bed, without forgetting that we must lie on it.

Right now, more than 80 per cent of Kenyans have faith in the electoral process.

They believe that the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission will conduct a free and fair election.

This will not be the case by March 4 unless a deliberate effort is made to support the IEBC, flawed as it might be, for the sake of the country.

The way I look at it, and I could be wrong, is that we have one chance to get the election thing right: March 4.

If we have violence and a constitutional crisis, then Kenya is finished.

What kind of power, what kind of wealth, what is worth flushing a whole country down the toilet for?

I hope sanity prevails, everyone behaves decently, and for the sake of our children and their children we have the restraint to conduct free, fair and peaceful elections.

The next president is the person who gets the largest number of votes at the election, irrespective of whether he comes from the bottom of a lake or the peaks of a mountain.

That, I think, is democracy.

****
One of my less attractive qualities is that I don’t praise, thank, congratulate and appreciate enough.

President Kibaki has less than 20 days in power, having served in a challenging position for 10 years.

We have spent those 10 years dissecting his weaknesses and beating him for his failures, rarely talking about his strengths as a leader.

Well, at the very least, Mr Kibaki is retiring gracefully.

He has not brought up that African nonsense of clinging to power.

We thank you for that Mr President and we thank you for your service.

Maybe once the dust has settled and we have the benefit of comparing your performance with that of your critics, we might discover you were not such a bad president, after all.

mmathiu@ke.nationmedia.com.