Lawyer & Women Rep Njeri Maina delivers Powerful submission in Gachagua Impeachment Case

Added: 2026-05-09

[00:00:00]The speaker of the national assembly via communication number 046 of 2024 notified the house of a special motion for removal of the then deputy president his excellency regard subsequently on the same honorable Mutus moved the aforementioned notice of motion and the speaker proceed considered to give instructions on its and among the directives was that public participation be conducted across the 47 counties.

[00:00:41]My lords, my lady, despite the lack of a codified regulations on public participation, there exists express and detailed precedents guiding and providing the threshold for the same. I refer you to paragraph four um of our submissions on 2nd October.

[00:01:10]A notice appeared on the Daily Nation page 14 and 15 detailing an intended public participation exercise on 4th October 2024 at selective venues.

[00:01:24]The result of that exercise was a negligible 200,000 responses from us has been quoted before you my lord roughly 52 million people translating mathematically to 0.384% of the populace my lords the purported exercise was challenged in court resulting to the orders by your brother sitting in Kirgoya.

[00:01:55]Justice on 3rd October 2024.

[00:02:00]The orders by your brother established a binding legal standard against which all subsequent public participation ought to have been weighed against.

[00:02:14]The same was served upon the National Assembly.

[00:02:17]In context, that order was not varied.

[00:02:20]It was not set aside. It was not appealed at all times material to this petition.

[00:02:28]The National Assembly therefore had a binding duty to comply with a court order by your brother to the letter as even the house that makes laws is not absorbed of obeying them. My lords, my lady, allow me to refer you to paragraph 20 of our submissions and read verbatim in law society of Kenya and three others versus inspector general of the police and four others 2024 KHC 10634 KLR.

[00:03:09]The court held that once issued, court orders bound all persons and state organs to whom they applied and that disobedience of such orders risk reducing courts to importance and undermining the constitution. The quote that I emphasize it is not for any party be it be he high or low, weak or mighty and quite regardless of his status or standing in society to decide whether or not to obey to choose which to obey and which to ignore or to negotiate the manner of his compliance. My lords, this speaks to the supremacy of the law so that no man is above it and that we all are under it. If the National Assembly cannot obey court orders, dare I pause, what business do ordinary Kenyans have obeying the law?

[00:04:16]It is imperative to note that despite floated arguments in regard to the political nature of impeachment proceedings, the courts have negated such avoidant interpretations of the law. My lords, I refer you further to paragraph 24 of a written submissions in the matter of Mike Movie Sonko versus Clark Nairobi City Council Assembly and 11 others, petition 11 E008 of 2022, KEC76 KLR that the court held for a political ical process. Impeachment proceedings are sanctioned by the constitution and the law.

[00:05:12]Subsequently, the national assembly should have conducted impeachment proceedings of his excellency regard within the confines of the law, not outside of that.

[00:05:27]In light of this, the orders by your brother, Justice calls upon this bench to determine and weigh three critical issues. One, what is to be deemed as adequate public participation?

[00:05:48]Question two, what is reasonable notice?

[00:05:52]and three, what is to be considered as qualitative and quantitative?

[00:06:01]On the first question, it is apparent that there was orchestrated systematic exclusion in various constituencies and some of the offices remained closed.

[00:06:16]This was not accidental. It was intentional. It was planned. It was visiating the adequacy of the process and its outcome.

[00:06:29]Further, and this is in regard to par paragraph 20 to 30, for adequacy to be implied, prior sensitization and education of the subject matter is necessary. On the contrary, no civic education was conducted. There was no material evidence accompanying the allegations.

[00:06:56]There was no opportunity provided for the Kenyan people to seek clarification on the issues raised on the form provided by the National Assembly as a template for public participation.

[00:07:12]This resulted in an obvious information bias. the danger of a single narrative exhibiting the inadequacy of the process.

[00:07:25]My lords, my lady, in regard to the second question, I presume my lords that reason would only be would have to be extinguished from the word for a public gazette that was issued on 5th of October 2024 and subsequently on the same day a public participation undertaken for it to be deemed as anything reasonable.

[00:07:58]My lords, it is the height of blatant contempt dressed as compliance.

[00:08:07]Courts have ruled that conduct calculated to defeat the purpose of court orders amount to contempt. I refer you to paragraph 31 written submissions in Samuel Minu and others versus National Land Commission and two others 2020 KHC 920 9233 KLR.

[00:08:37]The High Court stated that contempt proceedings vindicate the broader public interest in obedience to its orders.

[00:08:45]Since disregard sales the authority of the courts and detracts from the law.

[00:08:54]My lords pertaining question three.

[00:09:02]Your brother went into the trouble of quoting the Supreme Court in the famous case of BAT.

[00:09:12]He was very express in regard to what required to be done pertaining the public participation that it left no question whatsoever to what the national assembly was expected to do.

[00:09:31]the qualitative and quantitative aspect of the public participation. My lords, allow me not to quote the BAT case. I know it's um it's already on your records but I refer to it in regard to this would demand one adequate information provided to the Kenyan people which was not provided in this regard and sufficiently reasonable notice issued for them to be able to participate both of which are lacking.

[00:10:06]It is therefore my submission that on the test of the three, the purported public participation carried out by the National Assembly falls short of anything that can be deemed qualitative, quantitative, reasonable and adequate.

[00:10:28]The National Assembly, my lords, cannot use order 642 of the standing orders against constitutional protection of article 10 and 118 of the constitution of Kenya.

[00:10:46]Article 24 is expressed as to the supremacy of the constitution in light of any other law or any other provision that is deemed to be contrary to the same. Allow me to refer you to paragraph 96 overritten submissions and in specific the matter in orange democratic movement party and four others for the speaker of the national assembly and five others constitutional petition E491 of 2023 3 and E10 E 025 of 2024 consolidated and the rest your honor seven time in verbatim the high court held standing orders were procedural rules which guided and informed how the national assembly should at a minimum conduct its business including public participation.

[00:11:58]Standing orders did not however override the constitution and were not a substitute to constitutional edit on public participation as expounded by the courts.

[00:12:13]It is therefore clear that should there be any conflict in regard to the standing orders of the national assembly and the constitution the constitution of Kenya is supreme my role my lords my ancestors are talking to me my lords um paragraph 96 97 sorry my lords In Kenya National Commission on Human Rights versus Attorney General and another 2015 7634, the court held that the jurisdiction of the court to invalidate laws that are unconstitutional is in harmony with its duty to be the custodian of the constitution which promotes its supremacy at at art 2 by proclaiming at art 24 that any law, including customary law, that is inconsistent with the constitution, is void to the extent of its inconsistency, and any act or omission in contravention of this constitution is therefore to be deemed invalid.

[00:13:30]My lords, article 150 as read with article 145 of the constitution of Kenya does not expressly limit the time within which a resolution for impeachment must be arrived at or concluded.

[00:13:48]Standing order 642 therefore lacks constitutional bearing and is subject to judicial review by this esteemed bench.

[00:13:59]Its constitutionality must be examined under articles 24, article 165, 3D of the constitution that gives this bench the authority and the jurisdiction to interpret the same. My lords, it is my submission that demonstrabably public participation purported to have been carried by the National Assembly is for want of a better word, a shimolic affair. It was a display of the failurable nature of our attempt at democracy as a nation and if the apparent manner in which it should have been conducted was clear and loud from Justice Mongo's orders.

[00:14:56]Perhaps then the prevailing circumstances of a premeditated politically instigated process.

[00:15:06]It could have fallen or the orders of Justice could have fallen on deaf ears with no shield under order 642. The National Assembly is therefore exposed for what it exhibited as a lawmaking body that does not obey the law.

[00:15:29]This must result in an outcome that cannot stand in a constitutional democracy governed by the rule of law. Allow me to refer you to paragraph 33 of our submissions.

[00:15:54]In the matter of Mark 4 versus United Africa Company Limited 1961 3 year 1169.

[00:16:06]The very famous Lord Denning who was as classic as the good professor of law Gay held that if an act is void then it is in law anality.

[00:16:21]It is not only bad but incurably bad.

[00:16:25]You cannot put something on nothing and expect it to stay there. It will collapse.

[00:16:32]any subsequent actions undertaken by the National Assembly based on the null and void acts of the purported public participation must therefore collapse. They cannot hold in law.

[00:16:53]Blatant disobedience of the court orders must be rendered null and void in issue. My lords, my lady, I think I've kept my time. Um, as the Latin maxim goes, fiatia kam and for the benefit of our le friends, let justice be done though the heavens fall. My lords, I will not proceed beyond that.

[00:17:33]And um you know the Senator Agenda was muttering something when I said that I have my sisters my learned sisters here.

[00:17:43]Yes they are my sisters senator but they're not um they're not available.

[00:17:47]Thank you my lord. I hand over to my colleague Mr. M.

[00:17:52]Thank you.