bed at night. It is hard to refute this given
his public pronouncements.
In subsequent years we were to witness many
incidences of overtly preferential treatment
of some prisoners and the gaping double
standards that were in place to ensure that
affluent culprits were never subjected to any
discomforts thus making non-sense of our
jails.
The latest case of the open jail concept
has been the bizarre case of a Dutch
businessman resident in Kenya who was
murdered and thrown into a septic tank.
But the murder and the attempted disposal
of the body is not what puzzles Ochieng.
The puzzle is how an arrested suspect was
allowed so many indulgences including the
right to attend the burial of the same person
that she is accused of murdering. In Kenya
we may be operating on a new legal system
that is only privy to some.
Ochieng was further disturbed by the casual
manner in which the suspect was allowed to
comment on the very same case that she is
currently answerable to and even make her
own assessments on the culpability of those
she herself accuses as though the matter is
not before court.
The principle of law is that justice is not
only done but it is stipulated that it must
also seem to be done. Whoever put in that
requirement obviously understood human
nature and realised that the rule of law is
largely a perception.
Ironically Kenya is one of the countries
that have been flagged as a human rights
transgressor especially for its treatment of
prisoners. If Matiba’s family were to give
testimony they would point to the brutality
of the Kenyan prison system and one they
blame for the fall of Matiba.
So how is it possible to have in the same
country a harsh and unfriendly prison
system and one that is so lackadaisical and
casual to the point of one even wondering if
one is actually in jail. This is how perceptions
are formed.
We have heard of the new zero tolerance
on corruption policy and how everybody
must carry the cross of their actions and
face the consequences as an individual. We
have however not seen action being taken
on known culprits that continue to plunder
national resources.
96 MAL32/19 ISSUE
If we keep on arresting people and re-
leasing them back to society before due
process is concluded, it means we are un-
dermining law and order and soon Ken-
yans could find themselves having to
send the law abiding citizens to jail for
their protection since criminals will be
walking free everywhere.
We have become so used to sensational
arrests that our investigative arms carry
out periodically on the so called big fish
and the newsworthy rush to court only
for most of these cases to fizzle out and
lose steam with neither a conviction nor
an acquittal. It is hard to measure if any progress is
being made to combat what one can
call overt corruption if the actions of
the government officials charged with
the duty of ensuring that criminal are
brought to book seem to be partners in
the charade of defeating justice.
Most disturbing is the trend we have
created in Kenya where a suspect is allowed
to continue with their normal lives and
some back to their work position while the
so called investigations are on-going. It is
futile to allow a business as usual scenario
when an arrest has been done. Ochieng’s last word on this matter is that
we need as a country to get rid of these
open gaols so that we can differentiate
between the culpable and the law
abiding citizens since the reputation of
the country and the external perception
is dependent on it.
This situation is not helped by the fact that
we still have a deputy chief justice in our
open jail and this does not add credence
to our judicial system and one begins to
wonder if the judiciary is the problem in
Kenya as it seems impossible to convict
any influential person. If we keep on arresting people and
releasing them back to society before
due process is concluded, it means we
are undermining law and order and soon
Kenyans could find themselves having to
send the law abiding citizens to jail for
their protection since criminals will be
walking free everywhere.
All indications are that the investigative
and the prosecution arm of the government
are actually trying to do their work but the
jury is still out on whether the judiciary
is interested in having a corruption free
Kenya as that may still be their avenue to
riches.
Ochieng has stated before and still
maintains that Kenya is not any more
corrupt than any other country, people will
be people and the level of corruption in
Kenya is normal by any standard, where we
fail miserably is on the perception front.
The perception is and remains that in
Kenya justice is for sale and the matters
discussed above just go to confirm that the
government is verbose when it comes to
castigating corruption but their lacklustre
approach to taking action blows the
argument.
It is also not possible to find heroes
in such murky waters to be used as
examples for the future generation. The
open jail system sends an unfortunate
message that one does not have to face
the consequences of their behaviour;
there cannot be heroes without integrity.
It cannot be tolerable that the wheels
of justice are so slow as to ensure the
aggrieved cannot get solace as they
daily interact with those that they have
accused and who are now free to even
harass and intimidate them. Justice
delayed is justice denied, that principle
will not change, even for Kenya!