CJ Maraga is a marked man, and his faith and honesty might not suffice to save him

Chief Justice David Maraga is a dead man walking.

You know you are on death row politically when you are sent the Epistle according to Jubilee Party Secretary-General and Minister Plenipotentiary Raphael Tuju. He turns the knife with a smile.

His Epistle to the CJ is a devastating diatribe that he calmly called polite on KTN.

Polite letters do not call a CJ incompetent, duplicitous, biased, tribal and, worse, acting in disregard of the law and the Constitution.

They do not call him lord repeatedly to mock him or refer to the courts and justices as his courts and judges in personalisation of judicial service.

Polite letters do not impute fraud on the taxpayer by the CJ acting in cahoots with so-called tenderpreneurs.

ELECTION NULLIFIED
They do not pour scorn on his presidency of the Supreme Court in juxtaposition with the President of the Republic nor characterise the Judiciary as handing down judgments designed to licence the political opposition to break the law and disobey court orders.

Cultured letters are not followed up by TV interviews, which brand the Judiciary an extension of a violent opposition.

Mr Tuju’s utter contempt for the CJ recalls President Uhuru Kenyatta’s reaction to the Supreme Court’s nullification of his victory in last August’s General Election.

An angry President called justices of Kenya’s apex court wakora (crooks) and promised retribution.

SUPREME COURT

Deputy President William Ruto called the verdict nonsense.

The Executive and its parliamentary and party back-ups subsequently waged a scorched earth war against the Supreme Court, in particular, and the Judiciary in general.

With the President finally firmly in the saddle, Jubilee’s invective represents a continuation and escalation of the promised payback.

It prepares the ground for the removal of the CJ. Listen to Interior Cabinet Secretary Fred Matiang’i:

“We are pretending that we have a credible Judiciary; we do not have one. I am one of the people who have been frustrated by their blatant bias and we have clear cases of incompetence. We are so frustrated by the behaviour of this Judiciary.”

DEBT
Because President Kenyatta has described Dr Matiang’i as the third most powerful man in government, the last line in the quote above bears heft and clout:

“We are so frustrated by the behaviour of this Judiciary.” The Establishment’s arsenal ranged against justice Maraga is overwhelming.

The CJ can only summon the weapons of honesty and faith against The Presidency (President and Deputy), Cabinet, Jubilee’s legislative dictatorship and, of course, garrulous Moses Kuria and like-minded politicos.

Here’s the CJ’s story as he told it on Monday at Kenyatta University.

Some time in the 1960s, he accompanied his mother to collect payment for their pyrethrum crop at Sironga in Nyamira County.

After she collected her Sh5, they proceeded to a shop run by a man from their village to whom his mum gave the Sh5 and payslip.

HONESTY
The shopkeeper studied the money and payslip before taking Sh3 and handing back Sh2 with the words, “on payday nobody should go home empty-handed”.

Young Maraga could not wait to ask his mum why she handed over all her money and payslip to the shopkeeper.

His mother had borrowed Sh10 to pay her children’s fees and she sought to demonstrate to the shopkeeper that she was not refusing to repay the debt at once, but was simply unable to.

Mum told son to not only be honest always, but to also demonstrate his honesty.

FAIRNESS
Yes, justice must not only be done, it must be seen to be done.

But the government does not think this is what the CJ does or stands for.

The CJ insists all court cases, some of which have a massive bearing on Kenya’s security, are decided purely on the basis of the law and available evidence.

Next, he is persuaded that Kenya suffers from a lack of leadership thence the crises of poverty and hunger amidst plenty, which is why he called for a leadership grounded in humility, integrity and respect at KU.

POLITICS

But, incredibly, he said Kenya’s problems will be solved when all cease being “professional Christians’’ and get converted to “true Christians".

In Kenya’s realpolitik the CJ’s sword of honesty and shield of faith stand no chance against rampaging political power.

It knows no humility, integrity or respect, but is setting the stage for the return of a politically malleable Judiciary.

That’s what Mr Tuju called moderation of the independence of the Judiciary.

The Judiciary must safeguard its decisional independence by exercising it.

Opanga is a commentator with a bias for politics [email protected]