Kenya’s Internally displaced persons have once again started trickling back to their camps a few days after they went back to their homes due to fresh tension that has rocked parts of the country heavily affected by the post-election violence.
This has negatively impacted on the government’s project of resettling the internal refugees, in which thousands had resumed normal businesses in their former homes.
Three days ago, rowdy youths from the said areas forced back displaced people who had left their camps to the area – what was their home before the post-election violence uprooted them.
However, unwelcoming residents told them to return until the government released post-election violence suspects, said officials who had escorted them.
At the height of the election violence in February, there were 350,000 displaced people in 176 camps countrywide.
Yet the figures hide a disturbing scenario. Most of the returnees are hardly on their farms but are accommodated in satellite camps set up near their homes.
This is as a result of the current war of words between Members of Parliament from the country’s political divide in/or out of the government due to a proposed amnesty on those arrested during the violence that saw over 300,000 people leave their homes to safer places.
The war is rife especially between ODM and PNU MPs, parties that staged a serious contest during last year’s general election. Now the refugees’ survival is at the mercies of the laws makers who have conflicting ideas on the issue.
This was evident during the recent burial ceremonies of two ministers who perished in a plane crash two weeks ago.
In the whole blame game, the person to watch is the country’s Justice minister who has rubbed shoulders the wrong way with those calling for the blanket amnesty most of whom are Cabinet ministers and legislators from the areas where the violence was deeply rooted.
The minister has repeatedly said that the government was not going to grant an amnesty to those implicated in the violence saying that all cases are going to pass through the justice corridors.
President Mwai Kibaki was also recently quoted saying that the government was treating the issue seriously and called on the legislators to stop politicising the issue that jeopardised the country’s acquired peaceful status after the violence.
The government has hit at leaders calling for amnesty for perpetrators of post-election chaos, saying they feared more for themselves than the suspects.
The government says leaders advocating for amnesty feared that the suspects would name them when taken to court.
“The leaders who are pushing for it (amnesty) fear that if the suspects are brought before court, they will be mentioned,” said the government through the justice minister.
According to law experts, the clamor for blanket amnesty is contrary to both the letter and spirit of the Kenya National Dialogue and Reconciliation process under Koffi Annan, popularly known as the National Accord.
On 1st February 2008, ODM and PNU signed an Agreement that stated in part
“The final goal of the national dialogue and reconciliation is to achieve sustainable peace, stability and justice in Kenya through the rule of law and respect for human rights.’
The agreement expressly recognised the need to punish perpetrators, all criminal activities, particularly those of violent nature, should be prosecuted forthwith.
This according to the experts is in keeping with the country’s legal system which provides for the punishment of all serious offences.
In addition, the criminal law, however, has provisions for the promotion of reconciliation in cases involving minor offences.
Section 176 of the Criminal Procedure Code provides that the court may promote reconciliation and amicable settlement of proceedings where the offences involved are common assault or offences of a private or personal nature that do not amount to felony (serious offences).
The law also has room for pardon in what is referred to as absolute or conditional discharge. Under section 35 of the Penal Code, the court may, upon conviction for an offence, after considering the circumstances of the offence discharge an offender absolutely or on the condition that if he commits another offence within 12 months thereafter he be liable to punishment for the original offence.
It is clear that there is room for leniency for youths involved in minor offences during the post-election crisis. The decision to exercise clemency or reconciliation is however vested in the judiciary, to be exercised after hearing evidence, the government says.