Yesterday as the Court of appeal made its ruling against the BBI, furious Judge Kiage stole the show as he savagely pounded his heavy mallet mercilessly upon the Bill, terming it as a unpopular initiative that MCA’s passed for the mouthwatering price of a car grant each.
Tearing into the document he stated, “There was mad rush by MCAs to demonstrate party loyalty…the people didn’t matter. They received Car Grants & acted as if Parliament was in a state of Emergency…”
He further nailed the coffin hard and sent it crushing into the irredeemable depths as he quipped,
“Amendments should only happen singly and rarely”
Kenyans were impressed by Justice Kiage’s command of the queen’s language, his diction and the brute way he tore into the fake document threatening the sovereignty of the people.
While reading into his individual judgment, the bespectacled judge earned mileage of respect from the viewers as he delivered jabs after jabs of intellectual poison.
His speech was ladened in heavy English words, alliteration, symbolism and traditional proverbs that suggested he was also an exemplary literature scholar.
“Kenyans were keen to ensure that the 2010 constitution did not suffer the same ignominious fate as its predecessors and told the CKRC that its amendment had to be restricted… the people wanted a fairly rigid arrangement, the amendment of which would require their participation in some form…the people of Kenya made it quite clear that they were not going to cede the constitution to the vicissitudes and vagaries of political expediency,” read part of the judge’s speech.
So impressed by the Justice were the Anti- BBI faction that famous lawyer Ahmednassir twitted,
“Justice Kiage is truly the Jurist of the year.”
As he finished cracking his whip, the judge let loose a Shakespearian observation as he quoted,
“The same way new wine cannot be stored in old wine skins, it will be totally illogical to try and squeeze a transformative constitution within the suffocating straight jacket strictures of formalistic or positivistic interpretation. This Constitution is not a product of immaculate conception.”
Ironically, celebrations of the ruling sprouted instantly in many places and even in Eldoret, Uasin Gishu County the evening was lit with chants of elations but surprisingly majority of pro BBI kept to their silences, begging the question,
Did they all envision the BBI being slaughtered a while back?
Humorously, in celebrating the BBI defeat, one critic quipped, “BBI was dead long ago…today was simply its cremation!”
