Should Kenya pull out of the Rome Statute that established the International Criminal Court (ICC)? The answer is NO! A very big NO, if the word has different sizes! It does not matter what the members of the majority in the 11th Parliament say. It does not matter what the majority in the Kenyan Senate say and it does not matter what all of our new cabinet secretaries say. If we soberly consider the long-term interests of this country and our own chequered history, we should come to the conclusion that, for the time being and probably for the next 50 years, we need the ICC much more than the ICC needs us. Majorities are always majorities but they are not always right. Some of the worst political decisions that the histories of many countries record have been made or vigorously supported by majorities of one hue or another. It was the Hutu majority that perpetrated the Rwanda genocide of 1994. It was the Nazi dominance of German politics in the early 1940s that drove the final solution to the Jewish problem, which accounted for the extermination of more than six million European Jews. We must never fail to carefully interrogate a decision merely because it was made or endorsed by a majority. An intelligent and experienced warlord can build an effective armed force within no more than two or three years. Reasonably free and fair elections can be achieved in any country after only two or three attempts. Of the major institutions that collate to form a modern state, the most difficult one to construct is an authoritative and corruption- free judiciary that is roundly respected both within and beyond its own jurisdiction. This is a judiciary in which no one would seriously think of bribing the judge, the prosecutor or the policeman.
Posted on: Fri, 20 Sep 2013 16:29:52 +0000
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