NAIROBI, Kenya, Oct 5 – Controversial politician Moses Kuria on Monday agreed to become a defence witness in the International Criminal Court case against Deputy President William Ruto and journalist Joshua arap Sang.
His acceptance followed an email sent by Sang’s lawyer Katwa Kigen on Tuesday requesting to meet him over the possibility of becoming a defence witness.
“I am interested in meeting you to request for an interview and possibly your agreement to be a defence witness for Mr J Sang or both Mr J Sang and H.E. W.Ruto,” Kigen stated in the email.
The defence lawyer explained that his request to Kuria was inspired by his public statements that he knew how ICC witnesses were procured to fix Ruto.
The Gatundu South legislator in a response said he was willing to meet him next Monday or Tuesday at Parliament buildings.
“Regarding your request for me to appear as a witness for the defence, I confirm hereby acceptance of the same. You may now feel free to list me as your witness. I have not received any other request to be a witness except from legal counsel of H.E William Ruto which I also intend to accept,” Kuria indicated.
He asked Kigen to send particulars of the team that will be meeting him so that he could make arrangements for them to access Parliament.
Despite the request, the defence teams of Ruto and Sang however will be making an application of a no-case-to-answer motion which will determine if the defence will lay out its defence or not.
If the motion is entirely accepted and the defence has no case to answer, then the case will end at that point meaning that there will be no need to call witnesses but ICC judges will make a decision based on the evidence submitted by the prosecution.
However, partial or full rejection of the motion of no-case-to-answer for any of the three charges against Ruto and Sang will mean that they will make a defence case where they will be required to call defence witnesses, which will see Kuria take the stand.
Kuria has been in the news in recent days after he alleged that they procured witnesses to testify against Ruto together with Narc chairperson Martha Karua.
Karua has since sued Kuria over the claims.
ICC officials recently requested to meet him over the allegations of recruiting witnesses to testify in the case against Ruto and Sang.
He is expected to meet officials from the Office of The Prosecutor to shed more light on his allegations on ICC witnesses on Friday.
Last Thursday. Kuria however said he procured witnesses to testify before the Kreigler and Waki Commissions to demonstrate that the Party of National Unity had won the 2007 presidential poll.
He claimed that ICC officials later recruited the witnesses from the two commissions as ICC witnesses to testify against Ruto and Sang.
Journalist Walter Barasa, lawyer Philip Kipkoech Bett and Paul Gicheru are wanted by the ICC over alleged bribery of witnesses to cause them to withdraw or recant their evidence.
ICC Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda said the court was investigating other individuals suspected of interfering with witnesses.
Kuria and other Jubilee allies have asked any persons involved in procuring of ICC witnesses to confess like he has done.
