Justice George Odunga. In 2014, directed the government to pay the accused Sh51.3 million plus interest for the four years the award has been outstanding. PHOTO | EVANS HABIL | NATION MEDIA GROUP
19.March 2018
Summary
- The group successfully sued the government in 2013 and the court ordered that they be paid between Sh2 million and Sh4 million.
- They moved back to court after the government failed to compensate them.
- The 12, among them eight Kenyans, were rounded up on different dates in January 2007, detained for various periods, forcibly taken to Somalia, and later to Ethiopia.
The state’s failure to honour a court order to pay 12 people who were forcibly taken to Somalia on claims of having ties with Al-Qaeda will cost the taxpayer more than Sh51 million.
Justice George Odunga in 2014 directed the government to pay them Sh51.3 million plus interest for the four years the award has been outstanding.
8 KENYANS
The group successfully sued the government in 2013 and the court ordered that they be paid between Sh2 million and Sh4 million.
They moved back to court after the government failed to compensate them.
The 12, among them eight Kenyans, were rounded up on different dates in January 2007, detained for various periods, forcibly taken to Somalia, and later to Ethiopia.
The Kenyans are Salim Awadh Salim, Saidi Hamisi Mohamed, Bashir Hussein Chirag, Mohamed Sader, Hassan Shabani Mwazume, Swaleh Ali Tunza, Abdallah Halfan Tondwe, Kasim Musa Mwarusi and Ali Musa Mwarusi.
Others are Fatma Ahmed Chande and Mohamed Abushir Salim, who are Tanzanians, and Clement Ibrahim Muhibitabo, a Rwandese.
Some of the victims told the court that at the time of their arrest, they had just crossed into Kenya from Somalia, running away from a raging war and the should have been treated as refugees.
TORTURE
They also wanted the court to order Interior principal secretary to show cause why contempt proceedings should not be commenced against him for failing to pay the amount.
They argued that their arrest was unlawful and unconstitutional and that they were tortured during the detention.
They told the court that they had made numerous follow-ups for settlement but their efforts have been met with resolute muteness.
They told Justice Odunga that the state had not given any reason why the compensation had not been settled more than three years later.
The victims narrated how they were detained in Addis Ababa, where they were randomly beaten up by the Ethiopian officers.
They said they were held in crowded cells and sometimes in solitary confinement while handcuffed and blindfolded for days.
INNOCENT
They also claimed that they would be taken in turns for interrogation in a centre run by the American Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI).
The detectives tortured and subjected to inhuman and degrading treatment, they said.
The 12 were also interrogated by British and Israeli officers who also accused them of being Al-Qaeda terrorists who had gone to Somalia to assist the Islamic Court Union (ICU).
After the interrogations, the 12 were found innocent and later allowed back to Kenya.
In its defence in 2013 before Justice Mumbi Ngugi, the government said at the time of the deportation, the Kenyan border had been sealed as available intelligence indicated that terrorists from Somalia were retreating into Kenya.
The court heard that they were among the group that breached a security check point manned by the Kenya Army.
100 PEOPLE
The accused, the state argued, came in by sea and were among about 100 persons who were subjected to security checks and asked to identify themselves.
While some were able to identify themselves, the 12 could not.
“I must observe in closing that the state displayed what can only be termed a rather callous disregard for the rights of the petitioners who appear to have been simple innocent people who had gone to Somalia in search of a livelihood,” Justice Mumbi Ngugi ruled.
The judge added that the arrest and rendition demonstrates an attitude that is totally out of touch with the duty of the state towards its citizens.
“It is conduct that is not acceptable, even in the face of international terrorism,” she said.
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