Martha Koome is expected to make history in the coming weeks by becoming Kenya’s first female chief justice.
The 61-year-old came top of 10 candidates interviewed in front of live television audience by Kenya’s Judicial Service Commission (JSC).
“This woman is a breath of fresh air. She answers questions the way they have been asked and actually puts her own professional stamp on them,” someone commented on YouTube about her performance.
During her interview she referenced her difficult experience growing up in Meru in rural eastern Kenya in a polygamous family – she was born in 1960, three years before the end of colonial rule.
“I am a villager in the truest sense. My parents were peasant farmers and we were 18 children from two mothers. So, for all of us, especially girls – it was a struggle to overcome the odds.”
And she has overcome more odds to reach chief justice as she was not favourite, with pundits putting their money on Fred Ngatia to be the winning candidate as he had represented President Uhuru Kenyatta in the dispute over the 2017 election.
The Supreme Court annulled Mr Kenyatta’s victory in August that year, citing irregularities. A new vote was ordered, which Mr Kenyatta went on to win amid an opposition boycott.
Mr Ngatia may not have wonthe president’s election case, but his fluency and elucidation of legal jurisprudence on the floor of the court at the time earned him top marks in the eyes of Kenyans across the divide.
However Justice Koome was calm, confident and measured during her four-hour grilling – and her record on children and gender rights as well as her role in drafting Kenya’s 2010 constitution, in particular the Bill of Rights, stood out.
She spoke with pride about how the constitution now outlaws gender discrimination unlike the old one which “outrightly discriminated against women”.
“They could not confer citizenship, it allowed customary practices to prevail… such as child marriage, and FGM. We’ve come a long way,” she told the interview panel.
Last year, Justice Koome was a runner-up for the UN’s Kenya Person of the Year Award “for her advocacy of the rights of children in the justice system”.
She has also served as a commissioner on the African Union’s Committee on the Rights and Welfare of Children.
Source:Fiilafmonline/BBC
