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Peasant in Mbaluto case tells of travails
- Details
- Published on Monday, 02 July 2007 00:29
"Did the accuser say where I got the money from?" asked Mr Gichambati Mairo when he testified before the tribunal investigating suspended judge, Mr Justice Tom Mbaluto, on Monday.
He denied bribing the judge to get a ruling in his favour in a dispute he had with a former chief, Mr Sarara Sigore, who later claimed that he saw the judge take a bribe from Mairo inside a Kisii club."I do not even know where the Kisii club is," said Mairo, who at one time stood up to show the judges his torn boots.
"I have only another pair of clothes and when at home I wear my blanket." Mairo said he underwent many troubles because of the land, which was the subject of the suit he filed at the Kisii High Court and which Mbaluto later decided in his favour. "I was beaten many times and people were hired to kill my family," he said. Mairo said a witness at the tribunal, Mr Charles Sigore, who claimed he saw him with money outside the club had hired the people for "Sh10,000 for anyone they killed in my homestead".
He said the witness and the former chief had made a deal to divide the land between them. Mairo was once prosecuted for providing false information to obtain an ID card and was found guilty. Mairo told the tribunal that he never participated in the trial that led to his conviction. "I was arrested and immediately I was taken to court I was declared guilty." Mairo denied knowledge of entries that were made in the file of the Migori court that handled the case showing that witnesses had testified in the case. During cross-examination by Mbaluto’s lawyer, Mr Mutula Kilonzo, he said his citizenship was not the subject of the court that has led to the claims.
