Kenya Socialist Web Site
January 29th 2003

CHUNGA DEBATE: ARREST MOI, BIWOTT, SAITOTI AND OTHER THIEVES AND MURDERERS FROM THE FORMER REGIME

By Okoth Osewe

Mr. Bernard Chunga, Kenya’s Chief Justice, is under pressure to resign  just as Narc is also under pressure to sack Chunga if he cannot resign because of the miscarriages of justice and other crimes Chunga allegedly committed under former dictator Daniel arap Moi’s orders. Likewise, Samuel Oguk, a High Court Judge under Moi, is facing corruption charges in court after being grilled by Narc’s anti corruption police. Numerous top bureaucrats who served under Moi’s autocracy are turning on their seats, unsure when their turn to face the new broom and experience Narc justice will come.

However, the hypocrisy of the new Narc government in its current house cleaning exercise is exposed by its lethargy when it comes to tackling former dictator Daniel arap Moi who gave Chunga orders and whose crimes against Kenyans far much outweighs those of Chunga and company.

For example, behind Oguk’s trial for allegedly receiving a Ksh 520,000 bribe is a  tomb-like silence about any possible prosecution of Moi who looted 3 billion US dollars from Kenya that the former Dictator keeps safely in foreign bank accounts. The estimated Ksh 400 billion that was looted by Moi and his cronies between 1990-2000 alone appears not to ring a bell in the minds of the new anti corruption crew. There is no word about the billions of shillings Moi’s team looted from the Central Bank of Kenya just two months before the dictator relinquished power. 

Why hasn't Moi been arrested and charged in court for looting the Kenyan economy while in office and being responsible for the brutal murder of thousands of Kenyans during his 24 year reign of  terror, given that servile agents like Chunga and Oguk have been put on the spotlight ?

Reopen Ouko Commission of Inquiry
A part from Moi, the second person who could have been under intense investigation by Narc's anti corruption squad is current MP and former Cabinet minister Nicholas Biwott who was responsible for looting billions of Kenyan shillings through hundreds of shoddy deals when the former “untouchable” Minister wielded State power. In fact, Biwott’s case is even much more serious because he should have been in custody if the Minister of Justice was really unbwogable, given that Biwott is the only survivor who was named by Scotland Yard Detectives as a suspect in the unresolved and gristly murder of former Foreign Affairs Minister Dr. Robert Ouko in February 1990. What is the Attorney General and Minister of Justice waiting for?

A report about this murder is rotting at the Attorney General's Chambers as Ouko’s case remains in cold storage at the Ministry of  Justice and Constitutional Affairs that, nevertheless, should have acted by now or released a public statement to state the government’s position on this important matter. 

If plots, forest land and government houses are being repossessed, irregular road contracts terminated and shoddy land deals being put on ice pending investigation in a moment of change, why can’t suspected murderers like Biwott who used State power to eliminate their perceived enemies be tackled, investigations about political assassinations disturbing the conscience of the Nation re-opened and critical Commissions which were hurriedly disbanded to conceal the truth re-established?

Truth and Reconciliation Commission should led to prosecutions and compensations
May be, the answer is that Narc’s ruling class is still fumbling with that old idea about a Truth and Reconciliation Commission curved out of the failed South African model as a way of going around the imbroglio. If set up, this Commission is expected to soothe the gaping wounds of the Nation but then, Kenyans shall have been taken for a joy ride.

The South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission turned out to be a theater for mourning and shedding of  tears for past afflictions as horrified victims and relatives of survivors faced former members of terror gangs and death squads in emotional outpourings before walking away without solutions. Those who gained were those who killed in the name of the State. They were cleansed at the Commission in preparation for new public service and in a new South Africa as their victims went home empty handed and relatives retreated to tend the graves of their loved ones or to nurse their wounds.

If reborn in Kenya, the so called Truth and Reconciliation Commission will not dispense Justice if it styles itself on the South African model whose point of departure was  “Forgive and forget”, a stinging and bitter solution to friends and relatives who lost loved ones at the hands of a bloody Moi regime which maintained horrible torture chambers from where victims squeaked for help while others like Adungosi lost their precious lives which were needlessly wasted in prison following bogus charges brought by the likes of Chunga.

Bread winners perished together with Comrades who were crushed in the deep dungeons of Nyayo House where unlimited State brutality was dispensed by professional terror gangs. Other progressives like Hezekiah Ochuka were executed in cold blood after being stolen from lonely exile with their death certificates having been signed by former dictator Moi, now left to roam the streets in a fleet of limousines and Mercedes Benzes. Is it time for survivors of unspeakable state terror to forgive and forget the past or is it time for surviving merchants of death and subjugation under Moi’s Kenya to face Justice for past blood-letting of the ethnic cleansing type? Narc should be reminded that any Truth and Reconciliation Commission should lead to prosecutions and compensations after the truth is established. There should be no reconciliation without Justice of the South African type! 

Arrest Moi, Biwott, Saitoti, Chunga and other thieves and murderers!
Nothing demonstrates the hypocrisy of the new Narc ruling class more than the silence about that corrupt Professor called George Kinuthia Muthengi Saitoti, a virtual thief who earned the distinction of having shamelessly presided over Kenya’s mega corruption scandal of the last century – the Goldenberg infamy. Where are the anti corruption detectives because Saitoti is now laughing on top of the Ministry of Education simply because he made a correct mathematical calculation and jumped ship at the right time. Is there any logic behind taking the small fish like Oguk to task when the big sharks like Saitoti - with mountains of criminal evidence behind him - are quietly running the affairs of the new government because of political expediency?

Kenyans should expect more doublesidedness and hood-winking from Narc because the rules of the power game under "capitalist democracy" dictates that the ruling class will always protect their own sons so long as such a move is in their interest and regardless of where the interest or conscience of the Nation rests. Oguk has promised to expose Saitoti, not with the Goldenberg scam but with the Grand Regency scandal, another dirty case in a string of corruption cases that saw the name of Saitoti and others gain prominence in Kenya’s “List of shame”.

Oguk has named Moi as having dished vast pieces of land to his cronies. Are Kenyans going to accept this stream of endless political hypocrisy when it comes to action against criminals because Narc is a new government or shouldn't there be critical voices in the chorus of uncritical pro-Narc compositions that have been flowing freely like river Nile since January? 

Chunga, Oguk, Saitoti, Biwott, Moi et al should be arrested and charged on the strength of evidence that they are criminals of sorts. They are rotten potatoes who served under a decayed system of government which, unfortunately, Narc has inherited intact.

Corruption is part of the rotten capitalist system of government
Capitalism breeds corruption and even in the advanced capitalist countries where “democracy” exists, corruption scandals abound within the ruling classes. Governments have collapsed, snap elections called while protesters have poured into the streets because of corruption scandals perpetrated by the rich. Capitalist economies around the world have, time and again, entered into a cycle of crisis because of corrupt deals by politicians serving the system and Kenya is no excemption. Banks have collapsed because of corruption scandals while companies like Enron in the United States, have gone bankrupt after connected capitalist elites engaged in shoddy deals behind the backs of their customers. Narc will not be the first government to disentangle corruption from capitalism, more so in a deformed capitalist State like Kenya.

There is no escape from corruption when top State officials harbor great capitalist ambitions based on building vast business empires that cannot be built through regular wages. In a man eat man society like Kenya, the attempt to loot state coffers, grab public wealth or get corrupted while serving in whatever capacity is inevitable and the question is the degree of opportunities that present themselves for an official to be corrupted in the cause of duty. Regardless of the good efforts by Narc, corruption will simply be driven underground in Kenya because it is part of the system.

Reduce MPs salaries – minimum living wage to all Kenyan workers
For the millions of lowly paid State worker living from hand to mouth because of static salaries in the face of rising inflation, temptation of being corrupted in exchange for services will remain high. Eliminating corruption in Kenya will depend on whether Kenyans are ready to address the crisis of the system of government that supports corruption in the first place not the crisis of individual politicians who are mere cogs within the system. It will depend on eliminating the numerous privileges and wasteful lifestyles of state officials at the expense of the tax payer. A permanent solution to corruption lies in replacing capitalism with a system that can guarantee every worker a minimum living wage while at the same time abolishing the culture of primitive accumulation of wealth by a tiny minority of wealth grabbers at the expense of the poor majority.

Unreasonably huge salaries attached to state officials and Members of Parliament accords them lavish life styles which encourages them to be corrupted in preparation for economic uncertainties of the future when they may not be in positions to loot especially in the event of a change of government. It is the responsibility of  MPs to set the first example by bringing down their salaries to that of a skilled worker because if the government already caters for their housing, means of transport and settlement of other overhead expenses including “sitting allowances”, what is the logic behind earning Ksh 500,000 per month at the expense of the tax payer and at a time when the country's begging bowl is facing the direction of imperialist Britain, United States, IMF and World Bank? Aren't there good arguments for a Socialist revolution in Kenya?

We say:
Published by Kenya Socialist Democratic Alliance (KSDA)
email: harakatips@hotmail.com
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