CSs Matiangi ,Mucheru, to face contempt of court charges

The government suffered a big blow after the High Court in Nairobi rejected an application by the Communications Authority of Kenya (CA) to have a contempt of court application against government officials expunged from the controversial media shutdown case.

This was after Activist Okiya Omtata moved to court on Monday February 5, seeking to have government officials including Interior Cabinet Secretary Fred Matiang’i and his ICT counterpart Joe Mucheru be cited for contempt of court for failing to obey the court’s orders to restore signals of shut TV stations.

The activist also wanted Sam Iteere (PS ICT), Karanja Kibicho (PS Internal Security), Kamau Thuge (PS Treasury) CA directors including the Chairman of the board directors Ben Ngene Gituku, be cited for contempt.

The application followed government’s decision to shut down Citizen TV, Inooro TV, NTV and KTN NEWS for covering the controversial “swearing- in” of opposition chief Raila Odinga on January 30.

In his ruling, Justice Chacha Mwita held his ground that respondents cannot be allowed to disobey court orders and choose when to comply with orders then come back to court in purport of full compliance.

“The court would want to hear the alleged technical hitches which resulted to non compliance of the court orders”, ruled Justice Mwita.

CA’s lawyer Wambua Kilonzo had submitted that the contempt of court order application by Okiya Omtata be set aside to allow the case on the switch off to be heard.

Wambua argued that it will be a waste of court time to delve into the application since the government has fully complied with the court order after switching on Citizen TV and Inooro TV frequencies days after KTN and NTV were switched on.