IJCentral: International Justice Central

ITEN, Kenya — Witnesses of the post-election violence that broke out in Kenya two years ago have been receiving death threats, as the International Criminal Court continues its push to prosecute the perpetrators.
“If you don’t shut up, we’ll send you money to buy your coffins. You talk too much. You’re a woman. Shut up!”
The mother of six, who asked to be named only as Margaret for fear of reprisals, scrolls through the inbox of her mobile phone: she has received dozens such text messages over the past three months.
The midde-aged woman, from a small village in the Rift Valley, cringes every time her phone rings and constantly looks over her shoulder in the street.
She is a Kalenjin and her husband a Kikuyu, the two main tribes who fought each other during the weeks of ethnic and political violence that left some 1,500 people dead following the disputed December 2007 polls.
“Having lived with my family in the same village for all those long years, I thought they’d never touch us,” she said. “But ... my shop and home were the first to be burnt down.”
She saw women cooking for huge numbers and then 200 young men armed with bows, machetes and clubs returning from their mission and shouting: “We have finished the work.”
“I could not stay silent for what I had heard and seen. I wanted to confront my demons to find peace,” she told AFP, explaining her decision to testify with Kenya’s Waki commission probe into the violence.
That’s when her second nightmare began: her account to the home-grown investigation could make her a witness if the Hague-based ICC or a special local tribunal brought cases against key suspects.
Three ICC experts are currently in Kenya on the latest of a series of trips aimed at consolidating their case and assessing the level of progress made by Kenya’s government on setting up a local court.
According to rights groups in Kenya, around 10 potential witnesses have fled the country, with the assistance notably of the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights.
ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo himself voiced concern over the phenomenon in a letter addressed to Kenya Justice Minister Mutula Kilonzo on January 21.
“No one will stop the ICC by attacking Kenyan citizens,” he also told a Kenyan television network.
One rights activist who has been documenting threats on post-poll violence victims said he was keepiong a very loow profile for fear of being killed.
“Many of my cases involve people brutalised by gangs, militias and government security forces,” he told AFP.
The coalition government formed as a result of an international mediation that followed the disputed 2007 election has fallen behind on every measure pledged and needed to heal the country.
Despite government assurances that the problem was resolved, tens of thousands of displaced people were not able to return to their homes and their stories are slowly being forgotten.
“The suspects have taken over the voice of everybody else,” said Ken Wafula, director of the Eldoret Centre for Human Rights and Democracy. “They are trying to direct the situation, but justice shouldn’t be run by the suspects.”
Many of the victims of the violence that shocked the world two years ago, from the Kibera slums in Nairobi, to the farmlands of the Rift Valley, are willing to testify but they are increasingly aware of the risks involved.
Lawmaker Martha Karua, justice minister during the violence, warned last month that witnesses were being harassed by suspects.
“It is disappointing that the government can fail to provide security to the witnesses of the post election violence,” she said at a public meeting.
According to Wafula, “politicians are leaking out names of witnesses and endangering their lives.”
Six cabinet ministers are on a list of key suspects transmitted by the Waki commission to the ICC and who might face arrest warrants should Ocampo not be satisfied with Kenya’s own judicial endeavours.

source:  AFP