CJ Koome slams Ahmednasir, Havi and Ang'awa over scathing tweets

By Steve Otieno

Chief Justice Martha Koome on Thursday named and shamed advocates she said attempted to influence the court’s ruling on the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI) issue.

Without mincing her words, the Supreme Court President, who also chairs the human resource and disciplinary arm of the courts –the Judicial Service Commission- accused the lawyers of being unprofessional.

The CJ singled out Senior Counsel Ahmednassir Abdulahi, former Law Society of Kenya President Nelson Havi and Ms Esther Ang’awa for using social media to cast the court in bad light.

“The contents of some of those commentaries were in our view meant to influence, intimidate or scandalise the court. This, unfortunately, is emerging and unless checked, it will erode the confidence and dignity of the courts,” she said.

Such behaviour, she said, amounted to unprofessional conduct, especially for Mr Havi and Ms Ang’awa, who were appearing in the BBI matter.

Mr Abdullahi was fingered for his conduct and asked to behave better, especially being a Senior Counsel, the highest rank a practising lawyer is bestowed upon by colleagues to signify their prowess, growth, and standing in the profession.

“Once a judgment has been reserved and judges retreated to consider some issues and write judgements, learned counsels Mr Nelson Havi and Ms Esther Ang’awa, who appeared for the first and fifth respondents took to social media, Twitter on different occasions. On February 15 and 19, 2022 and cast aspersions on the courts. For counsel to appear before the apex court then proceed to hurl unnecessary diatribe, insults and speculations on a pending judgment amounts to unethical conduct on the parts of the counsel,” the CJ said.

She reminded the advocates that the law had a well-established practice where counsel and parties should refrain from directly and indirectly trying to improperly influence the courts in one way or another.