DCI urged to investigate publication of defamatory banners targeting CJ Maraga » Capital News

NAIROBI, Kenya, Jun 12 – The Judiciary has urged Directorate of Criminal Investigation (DCI) to institute a probe widely circulated banners defaming Chief Justice David Maraga.

The banners were displayed on footbridges in most parts of Nairobi on Friday morning threatening expose purported underhand dealings by the Chief Justice.

The messages bearing images of Maraga and other superior court judges come at a time of an escalating public spat between the Chief Justice and Attorney General Kihara Kariuki who has shielded President Uhuru Kenyatta from criticism over the failure to appoint 41 judges recommended by the Judicial Service Commission.

The Judiciary, in a statement to newsrooms, said the attacks are part of an elaborate scheme meant to threaten and intimidate the institution.

“The content of the banners intimated that this was a beginning of a ‘vicious fight’ targeting the Chief Justice in particular and the senior judicial officers who were the subject of the attacks,” the statement read in part.

“These attacks, which are clearly meant to threaten and intimidate the Judiciary, do not and will not detract the Judiciary from discharging its core mandate of dispensing justice in a fair,just and independent manner, without,” the Judiciary warned.

The Judiciary further called upon the Kenya National Highways Authority (KeNHA) to ensure that public spaces are not used to perpetuate criminal attacks against the Judiciary and judicial officers.