OPINION: Kenyas push for African Criminal Court Welcome Move

It is one of the undying legacies of colonialism that Kenya has always been characterised by tribal politics, which reared their ugliest head in the 2007/8 post-election killings in the Rift Valley that claimed more than 1,000 lives and left scores internally displaced.

The killings were blamed on the then young politicians, current President Uhuru Kenyatta and his deputy, William Ruto.

Early attempts to try them at home for crimes against humanity were juggled in the country’s parliament until finally the former prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), Luis Moreno Ocampo, indicted them for trial at The Hague.

Charges against Kenyatta were dropped last December for lack of evidence and official cooperation to get witnesses.

However, Ruto’s case rumbles on and Kenya has the uncomfortable scenario that should the trial gain steam, then its Deputy President could one day be dragged from power to prison.

It is a dreaded outcome that could in part be interpreted as President Kenyatta did not do much to save his friend and loyal ally in Kenya’s tribal politics.

It is not surprising therefore that Kenya now leads a continent-wide campaign for the creation of an African Court of Justice with mandate to hold criminal trials.

ICC TARGETING AFRICAN LEADERS

Also, the ICC is blamed for targeting African leaders and turning a blind eye to similar charges against leaders in other parts of the world.

Kenyan diplomats failed tragically at the Heads of State and Government Summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia last January to convince other countries to ratify the Malabo Protocol for setting up an African Court of Justice that would eventually merge with the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights (AfCHPR) to form the envisaged African Court of Justice and Human Rights (ACJHR) as an alternative to the ICC.

The country failed to get from the 54 African Union (AU) member states the 15 minimum signatures required to enable the protocol take effect.

However, officials were more than upbeat, saying the five signatures they got were more than encouraging.

Kenya now looks forward to the next summit in South Africa in June to get more members to rally behind their agenda in an effort to end the embarrassment of having African leaders seated in the trial cubicles of the ICC, looking more like cornered criminals than the respected leaders of their countries that they are.

The idea of an African court for Africans is not bad, but the real question at issue is justice for all and an end to impunity.

Over and above judicial mechanisms, moral decency and uprightness have to be
cultivated as universal values and culture in Africa.

Granted, people and nations shall always be at war with each other but attacking civilians is the worst war crime and those behind the atrocities should never escape the mighty hand of justice.

Africa has a lot of mess and rot to clean. Indeed, there is no reason the Malabo Protocol as extended in June last year to include the trial of cases of a criminal nature by leaders and individuals, should continue to gather dust.

By Mboneko Munyaga, East African News Agency