Author: Guy Bolding PW

The fate of Kericho Governor Erick Mutai hangs in the balance as an unprecedented legal showdown unfolds in the Senate, featuring a constellation of 18 top-tier advocates split between defense and prosecution in what promises to be one of Kenya’s most closely watched impeachment trials.

Governor Mutai has assembled a formidable six-lawyer team led by Katwa Kigen, a seasoned advocate who previously represented President William Ruto at the International Criminal Court. The high-profile legal team operating through Katwa & Kemboy Advocates includes Peter Wanyama, Rose Thiong’o, Doris Ng’eno, Joash Mitei, and Evanson Kirui.

Kigen’s selection is particularly strategic, given his extensive experience in high-stakes political cases and his close association with the current administration. His previous successful defense of President Ruto at The Hague has earned him a reputation as one of Kenya’s most formidable criminal defense lawyers.

The choice of Kigen also signals the political dimensions of this case, as the Nairobi-based lawyer has challenged the use of technology in the August 15, 2025, impeachment vote, claiming County Assembly Speaker Patrick Mutai had a predetermined position on the matter.

The Assembly’s Heavy Artillery

On the opposing side, the Kericho County Assembly has deployed an even larger legal arsenal of 12 advocates, demonstrating their determination to see the impeachment through. The team is led by prominent lawyer Elisha Ongoya, who represented former Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua in his impeachment case.

Ongoya’s involvement adds another layer of political intrigue to the proceedings, given his recent high-profile representation of Gachagua. His team from H&K Advocates includes Kimutai Bosek, Sharon Mibey (deputy county assembly clerk), Elias Mutuma, Hillary Kiplangat, Brian Langat, Geoffrey Langat, Victor Kibet, Evans Kiplangat, Elvis Kipkorir, Joel Wakhungu, and Vincent Kiprono.

The impeachment stems from serious allegations against Governor Mutai, including abuse of office, making irregular and illegal appointments, misappropriation of public funds, and flouting the Public Finance Management Act. The governor faces graft, abuse of office and misconduct claims, including Sh85 million fictitious payments.

However, the legal battle’s crux lies in a preliminary objection that mirrors Mutai’s successful defense strategy from his previous impeachment attempt. The governor’s team is challenging whether the county assembly met the constitutional two-thirds threshold required for impeachment.

The Disputed Vote Count

The controversy centers on the electronic voting system used during the August 15, 2025, impeachment session. While the official count showed 33 MCAs voting in favor of impeachment out of 47 members, Mutai’s legal team disputes this figure.

In a sworn affidavit led by MCA Naaman Rop, 18 MCAs claim they did not participate in the electronic vote, arguing that the maximum possible votes cast were 29. The dissenting MCAs have raised serious concerns about the integrity of the voting process, alleging that the system was “already configured and pre-programmed to start counting at six votes” and that the results were “fixed and rigged from the outset.”

The MCAs’ affidavit reveals troubling details about the voting system’s security. They argue that using MCAs’ payroll numbers as usernames and identity card numbers as passwords made it possible for unauthorized individuals to cast votes. “With these username and password details, anyone could cast votes, and indeed some people who were not MCAs stepped in to do so,” the affidavit states.

The allegations extend to claims that the voting gadgets, software applications, and hardware were not end-to-end encrypted, potentially allowing for external manipulation of the results.

Déjà Vu: History Repeating

This marks the second time in less than a year that Governor Mutai faces impeachment proceedings. Mutai previously survived impeachment in 2024 after the Senate overturned the Assembly vote. In that instance, he was saved by a technicality when the Senate determined that the Kericho County Assembly had failed to meet the required two-thirds threshold by a single MCA.

The precedent from October 2024, where 34 Senators voted in favour of the objection raised by Governor Mutai’s legal team, led by Counsel Katwa Kigen while 10 Senators opposed it, provides a blueprint for the current defense strategy.

The outcome of this trial carries significant implications beyond Kericho County. For Governor Mutai, a loss would mean the premature end of his political career just three years into his first term, following what was described as a landslide victory in the 2022 General Election.

For the broader political landscape, the case tests the robustness of Kenya’s impeachment procedures and the integrity of electronic voting systems at the county level. The involvement of high-profile lawyers from both political divides also underscores the case’s national significance.

The Senate has decided to conduct the trial in plenary session, meaning all senators will participate in determining Mutai’s fate rather than delegating the matter to a special committee. This decision amplifies the stakes, as it ensures maximum political visibility and requires the governor’s defense team to convince a larger audience.

As the Senate prepares to hear the case, all eyes will be on whether Katwa Kigen can replicate his previous success in saving Governor Mutai’s political career. The defense’s strategy of challenging the voting process’s legitimacy represents a high-stakes gamble that could either vindicate the governor or expose the vulnerabilities in Kenya’s democratic institutions.

The 18-lawyer showdown represents more than just a legal battle; it’s a test of Kenya’s constitutional processes, the integrity of electronic voting systems, and the resilience of democratic institutions in the face of political disputes.

With the impeachment trial set to proceed, Governor Mutai’s political survival now rests in the hands of senators who must navigate between legal technicalities and substantial allegations of misconduct. Whether he will be “twice lucky,” as the headlines suggest, remains to be seen as this unprecedented legal drama unfolds in the Senate chambers.

A grassroots uprising exposes the dark side of Kenya’s carbon credit boom as communities fight back against predatory contracts

In the sprawling rangelands of Kajiado County, where Maasai pastoralists have stewarded the land for generations, a new form of colonialism is taking root—one wrapped in the seductive language of climate action and carbon offsetting. What’s unfolding here should serve as a urgent wake-up call for anyone who believes that market-based climate solutions will save us from environmental catastrophe.

The recent protests at Oldonyonyokie Group Ranch, where community members chanted “No carbon! No carbon!” while waving sticks in defiance, represent more than local dissent. They embody a fundamental rejection of a system that commodifies the very landscapes these communities have protected for centuries, only to sell those “credits” to the highest bidder while leaving the actual stewards with crumbs.

The documents leaked to local media reveal a carbon credit industry operating with the moral clarity of a Victorian-era trading company. Consider the brazen audacity: a 40-year agreement that transfers all carbon rights from the Oldonyonyokie community to private brokers, with the community’s title deed modified to include “joint land ownership” for four decades. This isn’t partnership—it’s dispossession with a green bow.

The math alone should outrage anyone with a functioning conscience. While the community was promised 1,165 shillings ($9) per acre, the actual agreement specifies just 360 shillings ($2)—a bait-and-switch that would make a used car salesman blush. Meanwhile, these same carbon credits will sell for exponentially more on international markets, enriching intermediaries while the communities that actually maintain the ecosystems remain trapped in poverty.

A Pattern of Predation

What’s happening in Kajiado isn’t isolated—it’s systemic. Across 2.5 million hectares of the county’s rangelands, carbon brokers are quietly locking communities into decades-long contracts through a combination of deliberate obfuscation, false promises, and exploitation of information asymmetries. The Maasai Wildlife Conservation Trust, REDD+ projects, and soil carbon initiatives now control vast swaths of territory, often without the free, prior, and informed consent that Kenya’s own laws supposedly guarantee.

The residents’ petition exposes particularly egregious practices: “token payments to communities before proper measurement, verification or documentation processes, creating false expectations and eroding trust.” Some soil carbon projects proceed “without any scientific or credible measurements of carbon, making payment and carbon claims questionable.” This isn’t just bad business—it’s fraud dressed up as climate action.

The Kajiado situation crystallizes everything wrong with treating nature as a commodity and climate change as a market problem requiring market solutions. Carbon credits were supposed to create economic incentives for conservation while providing affordable offsets for corporations. Instead, they’ve created a new form of extractive capitalism where the Global North’s pollution is offset by appropriating the Global South’s landscapes.

The fundamental flaw in carbon offset markets isn’t technical—it’s moral. They allow the world’s biggest polluters to continue their destructive practices while outsourcing the burden of mitigation to the world’s most vulnerable communities. A oil company in Texas can keep drilling by purchasing credits from pastoralists in Kenya who must then constrain their traditional land use practices for decades.

The Real Climate Criminals

While Maasai communities face restrictions on their ancestral lands in the name of carbon sequestration, the world’s largest corporations continue pumping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere at record levels. The cognitive dissonance is staggering: we’re asking people who contributed virtually nothing to climate change to sacrifice their livelihoods so that those most responsible can maintain business as usual.

Governor Joseph Ole Lenku’s 2023 decision to revoke all existing carbon credit agreements, citing corruption, was a rare moment of political courage. That brokers quietly returned months later reveals the tremendous pressure these communities face from an industry worth billions globally.

The brave residents of Ewuaso Oonkidong’i Ward who filed the petition demanding investigations aren’t anti-environment—they’re anti-exploitation. Their call for mandatory Free, Prior and Informed Consent, transparent monitoring systems, and equitable benefit-sharing arrangements overseen by county authorities represents a vision of climate action grounded in justice rather than profit.

Real climate solutions must begin with the communities who have been successfully managing these ecosystems for millennia. Instead of imposing external carbon frameworks, we should be learning from and supporting indigenous and traditional management systems that have proven their effectiveness over centuries.

This means direct funding for community-controlled conservation initiatives, guaranteed land tenure rights, and benefit-sharing arrangements where communities retain ownership and control over their carbon assets. It means recognizing that the people of Kajiado aren’t obstacles to climate action—they’re its most experienced practitioners.

The uprising in Kajiado represents something larger than a local land dispute. It’s a rejection of the fundamental premise that we can buy our way out of climate change while maintaining the same systems of extraction and exploitation that created the crisis in the first place.

As the county assembly’s Committee on Water, Environment and Natural Resources begins its investigation, they’re not just examining questionable contracts—they’re confronting the moral bankruptcy of an entire approach to climate policy. The world is watching, and the lessons from Kajiado’s rangelands may well determine whether climate action becomes a tool for justice or just another mechanism for the powerful to exploit the powerless.

The chants of “No carbon! No carbon!” echoing across Oldonyonyokie Group Ranch aren’t the sounds of climate denial—they’re the birth cries of climate justice. It’s time we listened.