Supreme Court grants AG, tribunal 14 days to respond to Chitembwe’s appeal
Justice Said Chitembwe. The Supreme Court has directed the tribunal that recommended his removal from office, and the Attorney General, to respond to his appeal within 14 days.
The Supreme Court has directed a tribunal that recommended the removal of Justice Said Juma Chitembwe from office to respond to his appeal within 14 days.
Also ordered to respond is Attorney-General Justin Muturi.
The Apex Court's Registrar Bernard Kasavuli also directed Justice Chitembwe to complete filling his appeal documents and exhibits by the close of business Tuesday March 7.
Mr Kasavuli issued directives after justice Chitembwe's lawyer Peter Wena sought more time to enable him to complete uploading the entire record of appeal in the Judiciary electronic filing portal.
"The documents are voluminous. We have six volumes of documents, pictures, and videos that are yet to be uploaded to the e-portal. we seek to be granted time to complete the process," said Mr Wena.
The Registrar ordered the case to be mentioned on March 27 to confirm compliance on the filling of responses by the AG and the Tribunal and allocation of the appeal to the bench.
In his appeal, Justice Chitembwe wants the decision of the tribunal set aside by the Apex court and be allowed to resume duty.
The tribunal chaired by Justice Mumbi Ngugi recommended his removal over gross misconduct such as advising parties on the procedure to be followed to have an appeal which was filed against his own judgment withdrawn.
He was found guilty of four out of six misconduct allegations leveled against him by his employer, the Judicial Service Commission.
He was also found guilty of acquiring a proprietary interest in a land parcel in Kindono, Kwale county, which was the subject of a succession case pending before him. The tribunal said he breached the Judicial Service Code of conduct for judges.
Petitioning the Supreme Court to set aside the findings of the tribunal, the judge says the tribunal erred on various fronts and arrived at a wrong conclusion.
For instance, he claims that the tribunal relied on stage-managed video recordings produced by former Nairobi Governor Mike Sonko to pass a finding of guilty.
In addition, that the tribunal failed to find the video and audio recordings were obtained in contravention of his right to privacy as enshrined in Article 31 as read with Article 50(4) of the Constitution.
He says the electronic evidence was inadmissible as it was obtained in a deliberate scheme of trapping him.
The judge further says that the video and audio clips were modified or edited by Mr Sonko who also coached the parties in the videos prior to the recording.
“The tribunal erred in law and fact by relying on the alleged video and audio cell phone recordings produced by Mr Sonko and Francis Wambua to reach the findings and recommendations made, yet there was clear, cogent and unchallenged evidence by Amana Said Jirani and Jane Mutulu Kyengo that they had been coached by Mr Sonko on what to say prior to the said recordings being made,” Judge Chitembwe argues in the pending appeal.
He contends that Mr Sonko was on a revenge mission against him as he was a member of the three-judge bench that dismissed the consolidated petitions filed in 2020 over his impeachment from the governor's office.
He says he is dissatisfied with the entire findings of the tribunal.
