Cabinet bid to protect poll chaos witnesses

• Wako wants the law changed to secure evidence for Hague vote violence trials

A Cabinet committee meets on Tuesday to discuss better protection for post-election violence witnesses.

The team will consider changes to the Witness Protection Act aimed at strengthening it.
The meeting, to be chaired by Prime Minister Raila Odinga, will scrutinise the changes to the Act to pave way for provisions that guarantee witnesses safety and confidentiality.

The government has been prompted to take the step following concerns raised by the International Criminal Court, lobby groups and the international community.

Threats in Rift

It also comes in the wake of reports that witnesses who gave evidence to the Waki team were receiving threats in the Rift Valley and elsewhere.

On Monday, sources said Attorney General Amos Wako had proposed changes to the Act. They include provisions for operational autonomy, covert capability, confidentiality and accountability to ensure the Kenyan law meets international standards.

These are the four key pillars of Witness Protection laws worldwide yet they are missing in the Kenyan legislation.

“The law is toothless as it is now. Witness protection requires a lot of money through parliamentary approval and this should be done,” said former Kikuyu MP Paul Muite.

Should the amendments be approved by the Cabinet and passed by Parliament, the government will be able to relocate, change identification and sponsor witnesses.

Other proposed amendments seen by the Nation include broadening the definition of a witness to “include a person who makes a statement or agrees to testify in defence of an accused person.”

Also proposed is a fund to compensate victims of crimes committed by the suspects and provisions for cooperation with foreign countries in which witnesses can be relocated.

The amendments will also strengthen the witness protection programme, now administered by the AG’s office, by transforming the unit into an independent agency that can seek its own funding and whose officers may be allowed to carry guns.

Witnesses are expected to play a crucial role in the prosecution of the masterminds of the 2008 post-election violence in which more than 1,133 people were killed and at least 650,000 displaced from their farms and homes.

Key suspects

However, the witnesses have come under intimidation from the key suspects, with some of them seeking assistance from the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights (KNCHR).

The commission wrote to the ICC chief prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo raising the concerns and urged the Pre-Trial chamber to quickly rule on the application to start investigations.

Said commission vice-chairman Hassan Omar: “What is more worrying though are the continued acts of intimidation and harassment of witnesses. The audacity surrounding these acts of intimidation of witnesses is getting bolder and bolder.”

It is understood that six witnesses have been taken into safe houses following threats from suspects.

Mr Moreno-Ocampo has asked the government to take urgent steps to protect the witnesses as he awaits a ruling on his application. He has tasked Mr Lasi Kuusienen, a security officer at The Hague, to come to Kenya to asses the intensity of threats to the witnesses.

The trip was, however, postponed and Justice minister Mutula Kilonzo is now expecting a registrar from the ICC to assess the situation.

“The meeting with ICC officials has been postponed and they have indicated that another officer will come to us,” he said when contacted about the meeting with the ICC team.

The Witness Protection Act of 2006 was enacted in light of the difficulties that were experienced during the prosecution of high level corruption cases and those of terror suspects accused of bombing the US embassy in Nairobi and Paradise Hotel in Kikambala, Mombasa.