Mutunga ‘pained’ by persistent rot in the Judiciary

Mutunga said he was shocked, for instance, to discover that Judges and Magistrates bribed one another in an effort to secure a seat on the Judicial Service Commission/FILE

Mutunga said he was shocked, for instance, to discover that Judges and Magistrates bribed one another in an effort to secure a seat on the Judicial Service Commission.

“It causes me a lot of pain that an election involving Judges and Magistrates will be corrupt. Can you imagine a Judge bribing another Judge so that they can vote for them? When the Judges and Magistrates were electing representatives to the JSC, there was evidence of a lot of corruption,” he said on Thursday.

He said it was therefore imperative for all Kenyans of character to take a stand against corruption.

Regarding the allegation that Supreme Court Justice Philip Tunoi took a Sh200 million bribe, he asked that the committee formed to investigate the matter be given time to ascertain the truth.

“There are allegations, they might be true, they might not be true and we just have to let that committee decide but what I want to say is that it’s a very painful thing.”

Justice Tunoi has been accused by one Geoffrey Kiplagat, of accepting a Sh200 million bribe from Nairobi Governor Evans Kidero in order to ensure the Supreme Court ruled in his favour in a case that pitted him against Ferdinand Waititu and that put his office on the line.

READ: How Kidero bought a judge: the whistleblower’s claim

Following the publicisation of the accusation, Chief Justice Willy Mutunga came out on Monday to say that he had received the complaint in the form of a sworn affidavit from Kiplagat in November last year and immediately launched an investigation as per the Judiciary’s, “internal protocols.”

An investigation whose findings he presented to the JSC on Wednesday with a commitment to share them with the country’s investigative authorities as well.

The JSC resolved to form a six member committee led by Public Service Commission Chairperson Margaret Kobia to carry out further investigations.

The committee was given a week to make its recommendations.

About The Author

OLIVE BURROWS

With a decade of storytelling under her belt, Olive Burrows has been with Capital FM for the last four years and perhaps most notably interviewed US President Barack Obama. Committed to asking the hard questions and telling the story in the most engaging way possible, she has also interviewed Melinda Gates, a UK Minister and severally had the opportunity to sit across from President Uhuru Kenyatta and address the pressing issues of the day. Other notables she has had occasion to seek answers from are UN Secretary General António Guterres and John Kerry in his time as US Secretary of State.

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