Scribe to ‘expose ICC dossier scandal’

A journalist at the centre of claims of hacking the ICC website has threatened to spill the beans on alleged interference with witnesses lined up to testify in cases facing the Ocampo Four at The Hague.

Mr Dennis Itumbi told a parliamentary committee on Thursday he was conducting investigations into the alleged interference.

“As an investigative journalist, yes, and I will expose it in a few days and you will be shocked,” he said at the meeting with the Defence and Foreign Relations committee.

He also accused Mr Luis Moreno-Ocampo of recklessness in handling the information held by the ICC and said he was ready to show, through his investigations as a journalist, how the prosecutor was careless with information and the safety of witnesses.

The UK dossier documents tabled in Parliament by Yatta MP Charles Kilonzo and Dujis MP Aden Duale on March 8 claim that the UK Government is at the centre of an alleged conspiracy relating to the ICC, claims the British Government has dismissed as fake and malicious and meant to destabilise Kenya.

The dossier also mentions a head of mission as being involved in stage-managing the ICC witnesses.

Mr Itumbi, a popular blogger with a considerable following on Twitter and Facebook and the owner of a stable of county papers, is being investigated by the police on the matter in regard to alleged hacking of ICC and Foreign Commonwealth Office emails.

He was arrested and questioned but was released without charges.

Would be genuine

At Thursday's session, he said he was not in a position to tell whether the document being investigated is genuine or not.

He, however, said if police find him guilty of hacking, then dossier would be genuine.

“If it is true I hacked the ICC server, the document is true,” he said at the session chaired by Wajir West MP Adan Keynan.

Mr Itumbi, accompanied by lawyer Ashford Muriuki, also linked some human rights activists to the contentious dossier and said he would need more time to give an in-depth presentation on this.

He said correspondence between Mr Maina Kiai, Mr Ken Wafula and former ICC witness David Korros and several other witnesses could have a bearing on the dossier in terms of authorship and promised to make a written submission next week.

The others mentioned by the journalist were Mr Hassan Omar, Mr Wainana Ndungu, a former Swiss ambassador and Usaid.

Responding to a warning by Ndaragwa MP Jeremiah Kioni against putting names of other people and institutions in disrepute, the journalist said he was ready to defend his utterances.

“The emails did not come from me, they are available on nipate.com…the people who did it have not hidden it,” he said.

The journalist said he found the material on www.nipate.com and he trusted the site.

Mr Itumbi said Kenya needs courageous journalists who can fearlessly expose issues at whatever cost.

“If the price to pay is to go to prison for telling the truth, then some of us will have to do it,” he said.

He said the information he had could be accessed by anyone else as it was not classified material.

Mr Itumbi has sued rival blogger Robert Alai over claims via social media that he authored the document that is being scrutinised.

The committee will receive a written submission from the journalist on Monday.