Mwakenya ghosts haunt Murgor in his bid for CJ job

After Senior Counsel Philip Murgor explained to the Judicial Service Commission (JSC) how his arrest for allegedly sympathising with the failed 1982 coup birthed his dream to become a prosecutor, some of the interviewers thought the lawyer, 60, is a paradox.

Mr Murgor was a first-year student at the University of Nairobi in 1982 when he was arrested alongside 60 others for allegedly participating in demonstrations that the Daniel arap Moi administration deemed to be in support of the attempted coup.

Mr Murgor, the fifth candidate to be interviewed by the JSC, yesterday said he was arraigned and detained in "smelly stinking cells of what is now the magnificent museum of the Supreme Court".

Eight years later, Mr Murgor turned down several job offers from top law firms to become a State prosecutor, and this time he was tasked with prosecuting a Mwakenya Movement alleged architect George Anyona and others on the strength of controversial confessions.

Mr Anyona was one of the fighters in the push for multiparty politics. When the activist-cum-politician was charged with sedition in 1990, he insisted that a confession in the court record had been obtained through violent beatings at the infamous Nyayo torture chambers.

Curious trajectory

As prosecutor, Mr Murgor successfully defended the State's insistence that the confession was legitimately obtained, and which eventually led to Mr Anyona and his co-accused being convicted.

To one of the interviewers, Justice David Majanja, the move from harsh treatment by the State to prosecuting activists on behalf of the government was a curious trajectory.

But Mr Murgor insisted that he acted professionally during the Anyona trial, and throughout his time as a prosecutor.

"I prosecuted a case. The fact that I had an experience that was similar or not has no bearing. I am now undertaking a responsibility for a client. I was a professional, I was working in the State Law Office," Mr Murgor told Justice Majanja.

He held that as a lawyer, his duty is to the client, which in 1990 was the Government of Kenya. He added that he acted diligently in all cases he handled in Nairobi and Kisumu as a prosecutor.

It was at the State Law Office that Mr Murgor met his wife, Agnes, who is now a Court of Appeal judge. He left for private practice in 1992 and set up Murgor & Murgor Advocates with his wife.

Mr Murgor briefly returned to prosecute for the State in 2003 after Mwai Kibaki succeeded Mr Moi. He served for one year. The experienced lawyer yesterday said that he would leverage on dispute resolution with the Executive to unlock the standoff over hiring of more judges to ease backlog and workload in the Judiciary, while weeding out various cartels within the justice system to ensure justice always prevails.

Wrangles and rivalry between the Chief Justice hopeful and Law Society of Kenya (LSK) President Nelson Havi came up in the five-hour interview.

Mr Havi had written to the JSC contesting Mr Murgor's suitability for the Chief Justice job, on account of a botched attempt to convict Goldenberg scandal architect Kamlesh Pattni for the murder of German national Friedrich Wilhelm Kohlwes, who was shot dead in 1994 inside his Tigoni home.

Mr Kohlwes was Mr Pattni's head of security, and witnesses claimed to have heard an argument between the two, moments before the former was shot.

High Court judge Jessie Lesiit dismissed the suit after ruling that Mr Murgor's team presented a case based on theories but failed to prove anything substantial against Mr Pattni.

Succession dispute

Mr Murgor insisted that he prosecuted well, and faulted Justice Lesiit for closing the case before hearing from a crucial witness who was at the time being transported to Kenya by Interpol.

He said that both complaints by Mr Havi were filed without proper information, adding that the LSK President has a bone to pick with him.

"It is another false complaint by Mr Havi. There has been no complaint by Pattni or his lawyers. He has no proper information or understanding… Mr Havi has malice for me," Mr Murgor said.

In defending a complaint by his cousins on an active succession dispute, Mr Murgor said he took up the case because no other lawyer would represent the women of the affected family who now risk being disinherited.

"I always take a position on people who bully or take possession of other people's property. They are poor and destitute. I will represent them. I will fight for a woman, I will fight for a widow, I will fight for a girl, for free," he added.

Interestingly, Mr Pattni's defence team was led by another Chief Justice hopeful, Fred Ngatia, who faces the panel next Tuesday.

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