Court to rule tomorrow whether Senate can proceed with Gachagua’s impeachment trial

NAIROBI, Kenya, Oct 14 – The High Court will Tuesday rule on whether the Senate can proceed with Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua’s impeachment trial.

Justice Chacha Mwita preserved his ruling after Gachagua’s lawyers Paul Muite and Tom Macharia submitted that parliament conducted an unconstitutional process by impeaching the DP when other processes which includes public participation were not constitutionally followed.

They said that Kenyans were not given their democratic rights as enshrined in the constitution.

They said that the purported public participation it’s said to have been conducted at the county headquarters for a period of one day, and while the exercise was going on the impeachment process was going on at the national assembly last week on Tuesday.

The lawyers told the court that parliament passed the impeachment at 9 pm and the resolution was transmitted to the senate the very night.

They urged the court to suspend the proceedings at the senate which will commence on Wednesday to allow the court to determine the pending petition that has been spread across the country now standing at 20 petitions challenging the legality of the impeachment of the DP.

However the application of the petitioner was opposed by the speaker of the national assembly and his counterpart at the senate on grounds that the current petition is similar to other pending petitions.

The lawyers representing the speaker Benson Mukumu and Paul Nyamodi for the senate speaker told the judge that there was nothing new in the current petition in which the court is being asked to issue a conservatory order.