Standard Newspaper
All the Ocampo Six cases will now proceed to confirmation hearing after Government failed to stop them through an admissibility challenge and claims of fresh CID investigations of post-election suspects.
Now on their own, the suspects must now fight the charges facing them, against which The Hague judges will decide if there is adequate evidence to sustain trials, during the September 1 and 21 confirmation hearings. This is because the State lost the only means by which it could reclaim the cases and handle them locally.
But there is only one window left: Kenya has five days to appeal the ruling.
The decision by International Criminal Courts Pre-Trial Chamber II Judges means even the option of special local tribunal Kenya had dangled before the ICC in a bid to persuade it to surrender the cases against the six to her courts, has been rendered inconsequential and unhelpful in stopping the two cases.
The biggest blow was to President Kibaki whose Government has fought hard to block the cases on the basis it should be trusted to handle them under the new Constitution, and in the environment of a reformed Judiciary soon to get a new Chief Justice and Director of Public Prosecutions.
It must have been the hardest blow to Kibaki yet since Moreno-Ocampo read his list of high-profile Kenyans he wants charged with crimes against humanity.
Undiplomatic reaction
The angry and uncharacteristically undiplomatic reaction by Attorney General Amos Wako to Ocampos accusation on Sunday that the State was sabotaging his cases and protecting the suspects, seemed to capture the Governments bitterness and desperation over the turn of events.
It was also instrumental that, as with all statements cleared by the Presidency, Wakos was posted by the Government Spokesman Dr Alfred Mutua in his official website.
