Truth team fights for survival

After spending the first half of its term battling a credibility crisis and internal squabbles, the Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Commission (TJRC) appears to have settled down to some work.

The commission recently announced that it had hired statement takers to soon be dispatched to different parts of the country. “We are behind schedule. We came into being in 2009 but we started late. We now have statement takers on board  and we will have hearings from February to August.

“The commission will be very key on the cases that we select. The richness of the work of the commission is the statement that you collect,” said Patricia Nyaundi, the chief executive officer of TJRC.

“We will collect statements for five months and this will form the bulk and there are already reports from previous commissions. We are looking at Akiwumi , Ndung’u and other reports. By November 2011, when we are meant to hand over a report, I’m confident that we will have finished.”

The renewed confidence at the TJRC comes against the backdrop of a public relations coup it has apparently successfully staged against its most vociferous civil society critics.

Increased visibility

Regular appearances by commissioners like Tom Ojienda, the former Law Society of Kenya chairman, on TV talk shows and at public forums have given the commission increased visibility.

Even its beleaguered chairman, Bethuel Kiplagat, has lately resurfaced from a self-imposed hibernation to appear at press conferences. Dr Kiplagat has been the target of a campaign by civil society organisations to force him to resign.

The lobby groups claim the TJRC chairman is implicated in past human rights abuses committed during his time in public service. They also argue that Dr Kiplagat could be required to appear before the same commission as a witness at a later stage over the assassination of then Foreign Affairs minister Dr Robert Ouko in 1990, the 1984 Wagalla Massacre and an illegal land allocation.

Early this year, two fellow commissioners, including then deputy Betty Murungi, demanded Dr Kiplagat’s resignation in an article in the Sunday Nation. Ms Murungi resigned her post in March and eventually quit the commission altogether.

Dr Kiplagat has meanwhile not only to pleaded his innocence and sought to stay put but also led the fight for the TJRC by taking the battle to its critics and making unlikely friends along the way.

Last month, the commission controversially hired some 100 torture victims to its staff. TJRC officials have sought to justify the decision as a gesture of appreciation for the victims’ struggles.

For their part, the victims, through the National Network for Victims and Survivors, say they accepted the jobs following an MoU they signed with the TJRC to hire them as part of a reparations programme.

Former student leader Wafula Buke, one of the beneficiaries of TJRC employment who spoke for the victims at an August 12 press conference, said their engagement with the commission was motivated by the desire to foster reconciliation and truth-seeking.

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