Senior Counsel Paul Muite handing over the award to Retired Judge, Justice John Michael Khamoni during the 2015 C.B Madan Award at Strathmore University, where he was attending The Platform Magazine’s C.B Madan awards.
BY SAM ALFAN.
Retired High Court Judge John Michael Khamoni has finally been awarded the prestigious award meant to immortalize the distinguished career of the late Chief Justice C.B. Madan.
The cold war of yesterday-years between the administration of the late Chief Justice Zaccheaus Chesoni and the Law Society of Kenya (LSK) was laid bare at the Strathmore University School of Law when Senior Counsel Paul Muite presented Khamoni the engraved silver platter for distinguished service during the third C.B. Madan award and memorial lecture.
Chief Justice Willy Mutunga said Justice Khamoni deserved this year’s award since he epitomized the late Justice Madan’s humility, modesty, humane nature and “a great missionary of justice.”Dr Mutunga personally apologized to Justice Khamoni “for being a victim of judicial mornachy.”
“Justice Khamoni has been the face and gait of justice long before the 2010 Constitution decreed and breathed in new values into the Judiciary,” Dr Mutunga said.
On March1, 1999, the then LSK Secretary George Kegoro had communicated to the Judiciary the decision of the LSK Council to decorate Justice Khamoni on March 20, 1999, during the inaugural ceremony at the Inter-Continental Hotel in Nairobi. The late Chesoni reportedly summoned all Judges and told them to boycott all LSK functions and warned Justice Khamoni against attending the ceremony.
One week later, on March 8, 1999, the former acting Senior Executive Officer in charge of Protocol, K.W.J. arap Towett, rebuffed the offer and returned the letter.
Towett said the LSK was not qualified to assess or evaluate the performance of Judges in their judicial duties. He warned that the judiciary would not entertain any approach to issues that ignored protocol, recalled LSK chief executive Apollo Mboya to an attentive audience.
Surprisingly, this was followed by another letter dated March 11, 1999 from Supreme Court Judge Philip Tunoi, who then chaired the Judicial Training Committee, informing former LSK Chairman and now Senior Counsel Nzamba Kitonga that Justice Chesoni and the Judiciary could not, regrettably, participate in a training session on Alternative Dispute Resolution organized by the LSK in conjunction with the Canadian Bar Association.
On March 12, 1999, Kitonga wrote to the late Chesoni, through the then Chief Court Administrator and now High Court Judge William Ouko, explaining that the C.B. Madan award was conferred in recognition of ideals reflected in public litigation-focused as opposed to master-servant judgments. Further, it was meant to enhance a principled relationship between the Bar and the Bench, he had said.
When Dr Gibson Kamau Kuria replaced Kitonga, he wrote to Khamoni on March 25, 1999, to inform him that he had been honored with the award during LSK’s Annual Dinner held on March 20, 1999. Veteran lawyer Stephen Mwenesi had delivered the statement in support of the induction of the late Justice Madan to LSK’s Roll of Honor.
