We need more patriots like Akombe, new Kenyan heroine

Last week, Dr Roselyn Akombe, then an IEBC commissioner, did what Kenyans in high office never do. She quit her lofty appointment at the IEBC.

She wasn’t fired — she quit voluntarily. She resigned because she believed the IEBC could not — even if struck by a miracle — organise a credible, free and fair election on October 26. Since her resignation, Dr Akombe has been extremely candid, as she should, on the monster that the IEBC has become.

She’s provided irrefutable and incontrovertible evidence of a commission that’s completely captured by Jubilee. At least four of the commissioners and a good number of senior staff are Jubilee factotums. That’s why as an independent person of conscience, she had to quit.

Let’s put Akombe’s act of bravery and patriotism in context. Since the controversial 2013 Supreme Court ruling giving power to the Jubilee duo of Uhuru Kenyatta and William Ruto, the regime has been defined by its contempt for the Constitution and the rule of law. Constitutional commissions have been packed with regime lackeys. The state has been turned into a duopoly of two ethnic groups — the Kikuyu and the Kalenjin. The Kenyan state is more tribalised today than at any point since independence in 1964. A large chunk of the population outside these groups feels completely disenfranchised.

There’s even the open conversation in the media about secession. It’s not an exaggeration to say things are falling apart.

The Jubilee state has gone after every independent voice. It’s attempted to shut down NGOs and some development partners. Only the courts have stood between it and the complete emasculation of civil society. But this may not last.

On Wednesday, five Supreme Court judges mysteriously failed to report on duty to hear an urgent case to stop the October 26 poll. The police and security forces have gone amok. They have shot little kids and teargassed kindergartners. Opposition demonstrators have been met with brute force.

Attacks on Chief Justice David Maraga, DCJ Philomena Mwilu, Justice Isaac Lenaola, and other jurists have escalated. Recently, the police illegally broke into NASA supporter Jimi Wanjigi’s house and briefly detained NASA supremo Raila Odinga there.

We’ve learnt that the IEBC is run by political leaders who instruct commissioners on what to do. IEBC Chair Wafula Chebukati has been turned into a mannequin. He’s completely neutered.

CEO Ezra Chiloba countermanded virtually every decision of the chair and ran the IEBC as he saw fit. His arrogance has been on public display for all of Kenya — and the world — to see. He clearly has powerful protectors in government. Dr Akombe has painted the image of a totally dysfunctional IEBC that serves as an extension of Jubilee. IEBC has been hijacked by Jubilee and reduced to the state’s poodle. Even a blind mouse can see that it was utterly incapable of organising a credible election.

Enter Government Spokesman Eric Kiraithe, the state’s propagandist. In a stunning statement, Mr Kiraithe accused Dr Akombe of corruption. He claimed — in a case of defamation per se — that she was given money by NASA to resign and bring down the IEBC to stop the October 26 election.

I hope Akombe sues Kiraithe for every penny. Kiraithe, like others in the state, cannot fathom the concept of professional integrity and personal conscience. He’s incapable of believing Akombe acted out of patriotic duty. Kiraithe is no different from the pigs in Animal Farm, George Orwell’s 1945 allegorical novella of Soviet communism gone wrong. Like Moses, the novella’s craven raven, Kiraithe’s brief is to lie and cheat.

I suspect the state will do to Akombe what it always does to its critics and those with a conscience. It will smear her with false innuendo and dirty propaganda. Already, the regime’s attack dogs and apologists are accusing her of “fleeing” to her “second home” in America. The implication is that she “betrayed” Kenya because she had another country to run to. This is an attack on Kenyans in the diaspora. The Kenyan diaspora is the largest source of foreign currency. They beat other sectors like coffee. It’s diasporans like Akombe who keep Kenya’s economy afloat. The patriotism of diasporans can’t be gainsaid.

Akombe has signaled a new ethics in public service — you should quit if your employer is rotten. She’s signaling to Kenyans to develop a sense of public shame, and not be associated with a corrupt body. She’s shown that there’s no price for one’s conscience.

Hers is a challenge for Chebukati and other commissioners to step aside and refuse to be used as tools for authoritarianism, dictatorship, and corruption.

- The writer is SUNY Distinguished Professor at SUNY Buffalo Law School and Chair of KHRC.

@makaumutua