According to Kenya Broadcasting Corporation the ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo had submitted a request for an investigation, alleging the country’s political leaders had organized and financed the attacks on Civilians. Kenya’s 2007 post election violence reportedly left at least 1 300 civilians dead and more than 350 000 people displaced and hundreds raped and tortured.
“At least 1,300 civilians were killed during ethnic attacks or by police in the weeks after President Mwai Kibaki’s dubious re-election, and more than 300,000 people were forced to flee their homes,”
“The accused included several cabinet ministers, according to the state-funded Kenyan National Commission on Human Rights (KNCHR)” “The commission’s report into the violence was among the supporting evidence used by Ocampo, who had staked his reputation on the case after pledging last year to make Kenya “a world example on managing violence”,” reports KBC.
Court prosecutor Ocampo has also pledged to focus on victims as he prepares to begin an investigation into Kenya’s 2007-08 post-election violence.
“I have a duty to protect the witnesses and I will do it. “We are not going to rely on Kenyan authorities to protect our witnesses. We will relocate them when needed and put them in safe places,” he told Al Jazeera. Moreno-Ocampo said he has a list of 20 possible suspects made up of political and business leaders and that he will prosecute “those most responsible”.
“On Wednesday ICC judges approved an investigation into Kenya’s post-election violence, raising the prospect of political leaders from Kenya facing The Hague court,” reported KBC.
There have been similar calls by civil society organizations in Zimbabwe to investigate similar election violence perpetrated on innocent civilians during the run-up to the much contested 2008 presidential run-off elections.
During Zimbabwe’s run-up to the much disputed 2008 presidential run-off a considerable number of civilians mostly MDC supporters, members and activists were killed by know perpetrators which ZANU-PF maintains should be forgiven in the name of National Healing and Reconciliation while the victims maintain that the perpetrators could only be forgiven after justice has taken place.
Last month Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai said at the launch of a torture report entitled ‘Cries From Goromonzi- Inside Zimbabwe’s Torture Chambers’, the perpetrators of the 2008 political violence would only be pardoned if justice was allowed to prevail and that it was only the victims who could forgive them not politicians as President Mugabe has been advocating for.
Senior ZANU-PF officials like the Youth Minister Saviour Kasukuwere have been named as perpetrators of the 2008 political violence which left hundreds dead, raped and tortured and thousands displaced.
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