Court of Appeal and the mystery of presidential advisers' ruling

President William Ruto's economic advisor David Ndii and national security advisor Monicah Juma during a Cabinet meeting at State House, Nairobi. [File, Standard]

This past week has been full of controversy over the circumstances surrounding how the Court of Appeal handled the ruling that gave a temporary relief to the Presidential Advisers whose positions Justice Bahati Mwamuye declared unconstitutional on January 22, 2026. I would really restrain myself on this and even for a moment assume the decision of the court was right, the manner in which the court engages with the principle of transparency and accountability in Article 10 is worrying and at best a recipe to infer a judiciary, rather a court that is muzzled by unseen powers.

First things first, I, like many Kenyans, logged into the Court on February 23, 2026 since this is a matter of immense public concern, to hear the court of appeal proceedings. The court heard the Attorney General's application to stay the judgment on an interim basis and declined the same pending the delivery of the substantive ruling on whether to stay the judgment of the High Court which the court set for April 24, 2026. Up to that point, anyone who attended court would agree that the main ruling on stay was set for April 24, 2026.