Nineteen victims and survivors of police shootings during the post-election violence of 2007/2008 have today sued the Kenyan government demanding accountability for the killings and injuries.

The petitioners, a combination of survivors, family members of those who were killed, and civil society organizations assisting victims and promoting human rights, allege that the government failed to prevent and investigate the crimes, and to prosecute those responsible.“This lawsuit is a direct result of the government’s abject refusal to fulfil its legal obligations to protect the people of Kenya from police violence, and to respond with appropriate investigations and prosecutions in light of those police crimes,” stated Olang Sana, Executive Director of Citizens Against Violence.

“If the Attorney General, Director of Public Prosecutions, and other officials had undertaken their jobs properly, we, the citizens of Kenya, would not have to ask the courts to force them to do so.” The petition, filed in the High Court’s Constitutional and Human Rights Division, argues that several government bodies, including the Attorney General, the Director of Public Prosecutions, the Inspector-General of the National Police Service, and the former Commissioner of Police of the Kenyan Police Force, knew that election-related violence was going to occur and failed to take adequate measures to prevent it.

Furthermore, in the aftermath of at least 405 deaths by police shootings, the government avoided its duty to undertake proper investigations into these killings, even in the face of clear evidence that at one key location, more than half of the victims were shot in the back. “The overwhelming evidence shows that these killings and shootings were not legally justified, as the police claimed, but rather, in many cases, were targeted killings of civilians,” stated Timothy Bryant, one of the advocates representing the petitioners.

“The head policemen in Kenya themselves declined to address the criminal conduct in their ranks, and their stonewalling was successful because other important actors, including the Attorney General and the DPP, refused to institute credible investigations for fear that high-level people might be implicated.”
The former and current Constitution requires that Kenyans be able to seek remedies for violations of their fundamental rights, such as those occurring during the post-election mayhem, and that international law must be considered in Kenyan courts.

According to the petition, the police shootings and killings in question rise to the level of crimes against humanity, which the government is legally obligated to investigate and prosecute, because the police, without justification, indiscriminately and sometimes systematically shot civilians.

The petition asks the High Court to require the government to provide compensation, rehabilitation, psychosocial and medical care, and apologies to the victims and survivors. It also seeks the establishment of an “internationalized Special Division” within the Department of Public Prosecutions, to undertake proper and credible investigations and prosecutions of these crimes.

“The government’s willingness to brush off the pain and suffering of Kenyans around the last elections does not bode well for the future,” said Sana. “We want this suit to be a wake-up call; we will no longer tolerate the government’s abdication of its legal obligations. It is past time for the government to step up and be a government for the people, not for the political elite.”