Eric Ng’eno
Yesterday at 12:46 · Nairobi, Kenya ·
DEAR KENYA JUDICIARY: DELIVER US FROM EVIL
Some court orders lack a necessary sort of integrity.
The IG of police seeks to get someone he has reason to believe is a bad guy X. X runs to court and plies the court with some obviously self-seeking take of woe. Ex parte, meaning that the proceedings are conducted in the IG’s absence. Court believes X very much. So much so, that it decides that X is a latter most day saint and that the IG is a downright bad fellow indeed. And orders that X should not only be left alone, but that everything the IG had done in the course of investigation must be undone forthwith. So X has orders against the IG with threats of penal sanction by way of contempt of court proceedings ( which can be painfully summary).
So now, X may continue his bad ways and no one can touch him. Citizens cry to the IG to intervene but X has court orders. Isitoshe, X is actually endeavouring to have the IG arrested and arraigned in court. Arrest is the work of IG. It is for bad guys. Now, a possible bad guy wants the police to arrest the IG.
The judiciary hold that the Executive is in the wrong a priori. That X and all bad guys deserve freedom and impunity. That the Executive mandate to maintain law and order is secondary to the liberties of suspects. That citizen rights to expect tranquility and security are meaningless if suspects do not wish to cooperate. That in any case, proceedings are fatally defective if the Republic wish to charge X.
According to the new criminal-driven rule of law jurisprudence, the Republic is accused, criminals are the prosecutors on behalf of cartels, and the judiciary is a favourable umpire. X versus the (guilty) Republic.
What recourse does the Republic and IG have? Appeal, of course; we’re a nation of laws. Appeal. 3 years down the line, IG may be vindicated. Hooray. When the bombs have gone BOOM, villagers have been beheaded, businesses looted, cars stoned, evil sated with scenes from hell.
At the very least, the rule of law is supposed to deliver us from evil. All the clever arguments and sophisticated contestation should lead us to this rudimentary expectation: deliver us from evil.
When the law enforcers are profiled as fugitives by our court and the architects of strategic impunity hold warrants to arrest the Republic, it’s peace and security, the rule of law will have led us into temptation and abandoned us in the valley of the shadow of death. This is the tragedy of our time.