NAIROBI, Kenya, Jan 20 – The Supreme Court Judges hearing the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI) appeal petition have been urged to uphold the lower courts’ ruling that declared the process unconstitutional as the hearing entered its final day on Thursday.
Lawyer Evans Ogada, a respondent in the case representing a civil society group asked the seven-Judge bench to be bold and rule with finality that the BBI process was illegal in its entirety.
“In your quest to find judicial truth, we pray that this court remains alive to the history and mottled by corruption, nepotism. The court is besotted to remember our constitutional history and the price that was paid by martyrs who along the way shed blood,” he argued.
Ogada underscored that the appeal case has no merit citing that it was a means by a section of politicians to capture power.
“We are happy because from the gloom and misery that we are being subjected to by politicians the courts have displayed sparks of life. Please do it again,” he stated.
The hearing which has been conducted for three days will end on Thursday paving way for the bench to retreat and make its ruling.
On Wednesday, President Uhuru Kenyatta has been faulted for acting beyond his mandate by initiating a constitutional amendment process through the BBI process.
In his submissions, lawyer Isaac Aluochier who is the ninetieth respondent in the BBI appeal suit noted that the process of amending the Constitution is a preserve of the people and is clearly stipulated in the Constitution.
“We have no higher law than this Constitution. Therefore, we have to abide by it. If our Constitution is supreme then it is supreme and no law can purport to construe it and its provisions,” he said.
Aluochier put a spirited fight on the issue of immunity noting that the Constitution does not give the President blanket immunity and that the holder of the office can be sued if he acts outside his mandate as provided for in the Constitution.
“We cannot have immunity for impunity, no. We want a President who lawfully abides to our Constitution. We cannot have the President doing anything he feels like as asked by his legal counsel,” he said.
The President’s legal counsel who submitted their submissions first however, urged the Supreme Court to protect the dignity of the President by guaranteeing his immunity from any civil or criminal prosecution.
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