President Uhuru Kenyatta in his Madaraka Day address in Kisumu City on June 1, 2021, criticised the High Court's decision to declare the Building Bridges Initiatives (BBI) process unconstitutional.
The Head of State reiterated that the Constitutional Amendment Bill 2020 gives Kenyans a chance at a better future, accusing the judiciary of bending the will of the people.
He claimed that any other African country experiencing the political turns and twists experienced recently in Kenya in the search for greater perfection in nationhood would have burst asunder.
"From nullification of a presidential election in 2017 to an attempt to stop the will of the people as expressed through BBI, the Judiciary has tested our constitutional limits.
"While I stand by the Rule of Law and I will always obey the decisions of the courts, I am also compelled by my position to heed the sovereign and supreme voice of the People of Kenya. That is why our National Conversation today must focus on the consequences of choice," President Kenyatta stated.
He argued that the Judiciary should exercise their will and shoulder the burden of their choices just as ordinary members of the public do.
"If the field of independence has been expanded in the Judiciary, how should the field of their responsibility respond to the summons of nationhood? Shouldn’t their decisions also be accompanied by a burden of choice? These are the questions our national conversation should objectively ponder. And here I must be frank and ask what I believe to legitimate questions.
"It is a fact that were loosing close to 1 billion shillings every working hour for the 123 days we held the 2017 election. The question the National Conversation should ask is; who carried the burden of this choice? Was it the Judiciary or the people? The truth of the matter is, it is the people who carried the burden of this choice. Development programmes meant to make a difference in their lives had to be shelved; courtesy of the decision by the Judiciary," he stated.
President Kenyatta further argued that the BBI is meant to build bridges, create inclusive politics, and to end ethnic majoritarianism and therefore, a decision to shoot down the bill was inconsiderate of the cost benefit analysis and status quo.
He noted that the decision by the courts are to blame if Kenyans continue to shoulder the burden of losing 30 percent of the national budget to 'toxic politics' that the bill seeks t resolve.
"The Judiciary would also have asked itself another question; can Kenya truly be a democracy if the People are denied the opportunity to express the sovereign and supreme choice at the ballot box, on the basis of elevating technicalities over the overriding objectives of law?
"Our Constitution is not a yoke around our necks, rather it is a mighty sword that can break the chains that limit us. The moral foundations of Justice demand that the Judiciary bears the burden of choice and the consequences thereof; especially where the burden of judicial choices is proposed to be carried by the people," he concluded.
