The ICC trial chamber heard on Tuesday that Stephen Kiprotich Leting Chemalan, the Ngeria county representative, led the January 1, 2008 attack in which over 35 people died and allegedly poured the petrol on the church.
“I was shocked to be named. I went through the corridors of justice and I was acquitted. If need be, I can prove myself anywhere including at the ICC. I am confident that I am innocent and I will remain innocent,”he said in Eldoret yesterday.
Chemalan, Emmanuel Kiptoo Lamai, his brother Clement Kipkemei Lamai, and Julius Nyangio Rono were charged with seven counts of murder in 2009 emanating from the attack at Kiambaa Church.
They had denied that they had murdered Joseph Kimani Karuhu, Mitatia Rubia, George Muriu, James Mwirigi Mbugua, Margaret Wanjiru Mburu and Simon Gatimba Mburu.
A total of 31 witnesses testified in the case which was heard by Justice D.K. Maraga who acquitted them on April 30, 2009 citing insufficient evidence and poor investigations by the police.
Witness 536, the first witness in the trial of Deputy President William Ruto and broadcaster Joshua arap Sang, said she saw Chemalan and Lamai during the attack.
“I was not at the scene as claimed. I proved that during the High Court case,” said Chemalan yesterday in a joint statement issued Emmanuel Lamai in the company of their lawyer Zephania Yego. The two accused the ICC witness of giving contradictory evidence to whip up emotions and “fix” innocent people.
In his 2009 ruling, Justice David Maraga had dismissed as contradictory evidence presented by two prosecution witnesses, Grace Nyakero Githutha and George Kinyanjui, who identified Chemalan and Lamai as being among the attackers.
Chamalan had told the court that Githutha testified against him because she was angry that he had sidelined her at the end of his campaign for ODM nomination. She was also angry that he had refused to help her rescue her family from their Kimuli home during the post election violence.
Chamalan had said that George Kinyanjui blamed him for causing the arrest of his father after he was found with an illegal firearm and ammunition several years earlier.
Yesterday Leting said the Kenyan court had upheld his alibi that he was at his parents home in Plateau when he, his family and a neighbor, Margaret Kwamboka, had gone to escape the violence. When he heard of the attack, we went to the church, which is within Ngeria, to assist and not to fight. “We feel that it is in bad taste for the witness at the ICC to implicate us in the murders,” he and Lamai said in their statement.
“We urge the witness not to mention our names to whip up public emotions yet we are innocent of any charges related to the burning of the church,” they said.
Leting explained that he could not attack the Kikuyus at Kiambaa who voted for him overwhelmingly during the 2007 elections when he was vying for the seat of Ngeria councillor.
He says Kiambaa polling station was his stronghold and that he got 550 out of 700 votes. This year he got 750 votes out of 950 votes at Kiambaa which is predominantly still occupied by the Kikuyus. “Is this the kind of man who could attack the Kikuyus who dearly liked him?” he said in his statement.
- the-star.co.ke
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