Outgoing Chief Justice Willy Mutunga yesterday said the gains Kenya has made over the years risk being rolled back due to perpetual politicking.
Dr Mutunga, who was making his final address as the head of the Judiciary in Nairobi said government and Opposition politicians will drown the country unless they give dialogue a chance.
He said he was disturbed to be taking a job to quell political fires in another county, Maldives, South Asia, when his own country is struggling with political leadership.
"I have accepted this request and note, rather disturbingly, that here in my motherland, if the political leadership is not self-restrained, if they do not rise above parochial ethnic and jingoistic politics, as long as they frown upon dialogue and continue to maintain bigotry rather than ideology as the fuel and framework of politics, we risk everything that we have put in to build this country," said Mutunga.
He added: "Kenya's development risks stalling if Cord and Jubilee leaders continue maintaining their hard-line stances on issues affecting this country."
This came as Jubilee and Cord remain deadlocked over the fate of the electoral commission. CORD is calling for electoral reforms ahead of next year's elections, claiming the current IEBC, as constituted, will not deliver a fair election.
CORD, led by its principals Raila Odinga, Moses Wetang'ula and Kalonzo Musyoka want all commissioners and staff sacked and new ones appointed in consultation with all political parties.
However, Jubilee, under President Uhuru Kenyatta, had said any changes at IEBC should go through Parliament, and that anything outside that would be tantamount to overthrowing the Constitution.
However, Cord is reluctant to take that path due to the 'tyranny of numbers' that Jubilee enjoys in both the National Assembly and the Senate.
And now both sides have agreed to nominate seven members each to engage in negotiations on how to carry out electoral reforms in Kenya.
Meanwhile, Mutunga said he had laid a good foundation for the Judiciary in his five-year tenure. He however warned that the challenges the institution is facing are far from over and that more efforts must be put in to enhance access to justice.
"The foundations have been laid, but I am not deluded to think the war has been won, or that the journey is completed. Far from it,even as we laid this foundation, we were aware that there were many termites at work that sought to destroy our institution and abort our progress, and so far they have failed," he said.
He added: "Friends, these forces will not simply fade away if we do not stand up to them. It is up to all of you who now remain in the Judiciary, and Kenyans who are invested in a Judiciary that delivers, to stop the termites and encourage and glorify those who embrace transformation.
