Senator Onyonka on Gachagua's impeachment: 'We will look at evidence, not hearsay'

Speaking to Citizen TV on Tuesday, Senator Onyonka said that the oversight House will scrutinize all accusations floated against DP Gachagua and will not rush to a decision without a fair process.

The legislator affirmed that no charge will be made valid without sufficient and solid evidence.

"We have decided, and it is very simple. We are looking at the facts. If you say that the Deputy President has participated in disinheriting [the] children of his brother please give me the evidence. I am not going to be discussing hearsay," said Onyonka.

Senator Onyonka further noted that some of the accusations made against Gachagua, like making inciteful and tribal statements, do not hold water since he is part of a government that embraces politics of ethnicity.

He claimed that President William Ruto has also fallen victim to tribalism, arguing that he has appointed his tribesmen to his government.

"Isn't that what the President has done in employing Permanent Secretaries? What Gachagua has done is not shocking. That is how we have been behaving," Onyonka noted. 

"When we in the Senate are looking at this impeachment we don't see Gachagua as a failure, a tribalist, we see him as a consequence of this system which has become so dysfunctional that all we do when we seek power is to take state resources and share them between our friends, relatives and tribesmen."

Gachagua is facing 11 charges, including gross violation of the Constitution, undermining the President and the Cabinet, undermining Devolution, and compromising judicial independence by publicly attacking a judge. 

Additional accusations included making inciteful statements, committing economic crimes, spreading false, malicious, divisive, and inciteful remarks, public insubordination of the President, and persistently bullying State and public officers.

The National Assembly voted overwhelmingly for his ouster as 281 members voted in its favour, 44 voted against it and 1 abstained.

The Senate is set to prosecute the matter on Wednesday and Thursday as directed by Speaker Amason Kingi.

Meanwhile, Gachagua's legal team and other petitioners have presented their case before the High Court seeking to block the Senate from acting on the matter.

Chief Justice Martha Koome has appointed a three-judge bench comprising Justices Eric Ogola, Anthony Mrima and Freda Mugambi to hear the petitions.