BY LEDAMA OLEKINA
Last week, the Senate made history by impeaching Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua.
To be honest, having not voted for the UDA duo, I was not particularly invested in whether Gachagua remained DP or not, but as a fi rm believer in the Constitution, I was compelled to carefully weigh the evidence.
In the end, I was proud to have been among those who voted to determine Gachagua’s fate because impeachment, at its core, is about accountability.
Under Article 147 of the Constitution, the DP is the principal assistant to the President.
The job requires a steady hand, a unifying spirit and, above all, an unwavering commitment to the rule of law.
These are all qualities that, unfortunately, Gachagua failed to demonstrate.
One of the most troubling aspects of Gachagua’s tenure was his repeated use of divisive rhetoric.
He positioned himself as a defender of his ethnic group and frequently reminded the country that his region played a decisive role in electing the President and should be handsomely rewarded because of it.
The damage from such rhetoric cannot be overstated in a country with Kenya’s history of ethnic tensions.
But words alone were not the basis of Gachagua’s impeachment.
Though he faced 11 charges, the one that struck me the most was his blatant disregard for judicial authority.
According to Section 132 of the Penal Code, it is illegal for any public officer to make statements that demean a state office.
Gachagua crossed that line repeatedly when he publicly disparaged Justice Esther Maina after losing a corruption case. Instead of respecting the court’s ruling, despite his disagreement, he sought to politicise it by accusing the Judiciary of corruption without providing any evidence.
Rather than pursuing legal redress through the courts, as any aggrieved party can, Gachagua used his office to pressure the Asset Recovery Agency into refunding the money that had been deemed proceeds of corruption.
Gachagua’s behaviour on this matter alone raises serious questions about whether he could even pass a basic third-grade civics class, let alone undertake the weighty responsibilities of his office.
This act of coercion was not just breathtakingly illegal but beneath the station of a Deputy President.
It resembled the
actions of a mob boss rather than a statesman