Kenya’s National Assembly voted to uphold Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua’s impeachment on Tuesday, 8th October 2024. An overwhelming majority of 281 Members of Parliament voted in favour of the impeachment motion which Kibwezi West MP, Mwengi Mutuse, had tabled.
Gachagua has since moved to the courts seeking to suspend the hearing of his impeachment motion in the Senate. High Court Justice Lawrence Mugambi has since referred the case to Chief Justice Martha Koome, proposing the constitution of a three-bench judge panel to hear it. Justice Mugambi cited great public interest and weighty constitutional concerns arising from the petition in referring it to the Chief Justice.
Gachagua relied on the Judiciary to overturn the impeachment case. The legislature is seemingly hell-bent on ousting the deputy president.
However, a plenary hearing by the High Court judges appointed threw out Gachagua’s appeal, leaving him at the mercy of the Senate. Despite an almighty showdown and a brave act by Gachagua’s lawyers, the Senate still voted to uphold the impeachment of Rigathi Gachagua.
Gachagua skipped the impeachment vote, citing health concerns and asked for the impeachment vote to be postponed by 5 days. His pleas, however, fell on deaf ears.
Table of Contents
Gachagua’s Impeachment Woes
Gachagua’s 11-charge impeachment motion comprises claims of amassing wealth worth about Ksh 5.2 Billion (US$ 40 Million) through corrupt means, disregard for the Office of the President and Cabinet, fueling ethnicity and undermining devolution.
Gachagua has denied any wrongdoing, citing the impeachment saga as a political witchhunt orchestrated by a clique of politicians who want him out of office.
Gachagua had initially come under fire during the initial days of his tenure for claiming that the government is a corporation with special drawing rights for those who had invested in the election of the regime first. He has been accused of undermining national unity by his sworn claims to defend the sovereignty of the ‘mountain’.
The ‘mountain’ is in reference to the vote-rich Mount Kenya region where he hails from, and encompasses of huge chunk of the Kikuyu population. Gachagua has hailed himself as being the self-appointed defender of the interests of the Kikuyu people and the larger GEMA community at large.
Evidence of a soured bromance between him and President Ruto came to light during the anti-government protests. There had been hushes about a fallout between the two beforehand. However, the protests emboldened the deputy president to speak up against his boss. A ‘handshake of sorts’ between the President and the opposition chief Raila Odinga further embittered the relationship between him and his deputy.
In the lead-up to the impeachment motion, Gachagua had come out guns blazing against the President, accusing him of being misled by his closest political advisors into leading the country towards the wrong direction. He called out the president for sideling him in the administration of the country.
Gachagua’s impeachment motion is expected to be tabled, heard and determined at the Senate on Wednesday and Thursday (16th and 17th October respectively). The Senate is expected to uphold the impeachment motion.
A Compromised Legislature
The Kenyan Constitution of 2010 established three arms of government (the legislature, the judiciary and the executive) and provided for their independent co-existence in the execution of their mandate. However, the independence of these three arms has come under great scrutiny in recent days.
President Ruto has been keen to solidify the power of government under the Office of the President which is enshrined in Kenya’s executive branch. His first order of business was to establish a majority in parliament through MPs affiliated with the Kenya Kwanza coalition. He has been quick to identify opportunities to woo MPs from the opposition to the fold of his government.
During the height of the anti-government protests, the president extended an olive branch to members of the opposition coalition, giving them a chance to join his government by offering them lucrative positions in his Cabinet.
President Ruto now holds an overarching influence over both houses of the legislature, and many of the country’s elected officials are under his beck and call.
The judiciary has not been spared either. Earlier in the year, the President was involved in a showdown of sorts with the judiciary, whom he called out for being against the transformative agenda of his government’s projects. The judiciary had been offering much-needed criticism to the government, halting some of its projects and initiatives that it found to be unconstitutional or anchored in acts of grand larceny.
However, it has managed to stand relatively unscathed from the pressure. Nonetheless, since it cannot enforce rulings or the constitutionality of the law, it lacks the biting force needed to keep the government in check.
What next?
The conclusion of the impeachment motion in the legislative arm is just about done and dusted. Gachagua retains a very slim chance of making it through the Senate, given the President’s sway over the chamber.
Speaking of which, President Ruto has been eerily quiet about the impeachment saga, perhaps leaving the matter to his political cronies to take care of.
It is expected that Ruto will appoint a Deputy President from his inner circle who hails from the Mount Kenya region as well to keep the balance of power in check. Consequently, many have fronted the Interior Cabinet Secretary Kithure Kindiki as being the successor to Gachagua.
Should Gachagua survive the impeachment process by any chance, he will continue to face insurmountable pressure and the regime will find every way possible to pressure him out of office.
Many have termed the move to remove Gachagua from office as a careless and uncalculated move by the President and his allies. It has contributed to making the regime even more unpopular with Kenyans, especially stemming from the heights of the anti-regime movement that is gathering momentum in the country.
It is a greedy move by the President who has sought to deploy every trick in the book to consolidate power for himself and his close circle of allies. Consequently, all it does is gain him even more dissidence from Kenyans, particularly those from the Mount Kenya region who came out in droves to vote for him in 2022.
Gachagua will take with him a chunk of the support for the President from his backyard. It should be remembered that President Ruto’s path to power was fueled by the ‘distrust’ and ‘dissidence’ he received from President Uhuru when he served as his deputy. The same weapons he used to ascend to power can also be used against him.
Furthermore, President Ruto is seemingly backing too much on his new-found alliance with the opposition coalition, particularly made up of legislatures from the Luo-Nyanza region. Should a fall-out happen between Ruto and Raila, a huge chunk of this support might fade away as well.
The support for Ruto by Raila’s allies is dependent on Raila’s bid for the Chairmanship of the African Union. Should Raila fail in this, he may turn his back on the President and re-focus his attention back on national politics.
How the situation will unfold remains to be witnessed.
More importantly, however, the impeachment saga should be seen as nothing short of a circus show. The government has utilized the public interest on the matter to misdirect the attention of Kenyans from the important issues at hand.
The system of governance is failing. Corruption is rampant. Public services such as healthcare and education are becoming inaccessible to many. The country’s crucial infrastructure is being auctioned off to private investors. Kenyans continue to suffer under the weight of the burden placed upon them by the government.
The government has no tangible solutions to offer. So it has decided to turn its back and turn its attention from the problems at hand.
Leave a Reply