Senior Counsel Ahmednasir lashes out at Government for disobeying court orders

Senior Counsel Ahmednasir Abdullahi has weighed in on the media shutdown debacle.

Ahmednasir faulted the Government over the media shutdown saying that it must observe the rule of law and dictates of the Constitution.

“No matter how aggrieved and unhappy the Kenyan Government is...it MUST obey/adhere to COURT ORDERS and switch on TV signal...as a constitutional democracy that is simply not negotiable,” Ahmednasir posted on his Twitter account on Saturday.

The outspoken lawyer took a dig at National Super Alliance (NASA) saying that the skipping of Raila Odinga’s ‘swearing-in’ by Wiper leader Kalonzo Musyoka, ANC’s Musalia Mudavadi and Ford Kenya’s Moses Wetang’ula gave Jubilee a priceless narrative on why the coalition could be disintegrating.

“The JUBILEE govt has a priceless narrative/propaganda...watching from distance the implosion & disintegration of NASA...& laughing at the silly excuses Musyoka/Wetang’ula/Mudavadi gave on why they boycotted Hon Raila's clownish act of swearing himself as the people's President,” he added.

He further took a swipe at the Government indicating they were taking advantage of Raila’s ‘reckless acts’ by arresting his allies and switching off TV signals.

"JUBILEE was Hogging the universal condemnation of Raila for his reckless acts. By arresting miscreants/tramps like Miguna Miguna who in his late 50s has never found meaningful purpose in life...by switching off TV signals for a long period...by willfully disobeying court orders," Ahmednasir said.

He also said the Government risked being viewed as a threat to democracy and constitutionalism.

“JUBILEE is being clumsy and needlessly turns a historic victory and propaganda coup into a senseless defeat. Instead of picking the pieces from NASA's implosion, the country/world is debating whether the JUBILEE govt is threat to constitutionalism...and that is unfortunate,” Ahmednasir pointed out.

In a press briefing on Wednesday, Interior Cabinet Secretary Dr Fred Matiang’i maintained that the switch-off of the media houses (KTN News, NTV, Citizen TV, Inooro TV and Radio Citizen) would remain in place until investigations into NASA’s National Resistance Movement (NRM) activities had been concluded.

“Media owners and all relevant actors had been given a full security situation brief well ahead of the illegal activities of NASA. Unfortunately, some media houses chose to disregard this advice, their own code of ethics, self- regulations and moral responsibility to every Kenyan to safeguard security of their fellow citizens,” the CS stated at Harambee House.

The former Education CS further noted that coverage by the media would have led to incitement and a ‘massacre of catastrophic proportions’ was going to happen.

“The Government’s responsibility is to protect the lives of people. We are committed to the rule of law,” Matiang’i said.

The High Court, however, on Thursday suspended the Government’s directive to shut down the three leading TV stations in the country pending a full hearing of the case that was filed by Activist Okiya Omtatah on Thursday.

Judge Chacha Mwita ordered the Communications Authority of Kenya (CA) to restore live transmission for the stations.

He also barred the State from interfering with the signals of the various TV stations.

CA has, however, not responded to the High Court’s order.