One day in 1993, Lieutenant Colonel Benjamin Muemawas forced to resign at gunpoint for a ‘sin’ that was committed by his father.
He was subsequently handed to flying squad officers from Pangani Police Station in a plot hatched to ensure he ended up in jail for a long time.
The officer’s only fault was that his father, the late Samuel Muema, joined an opposition party, Democratic Party in 1992, which infuriated his army bosses.
During the multi-party euphoria which dominated th toe country in that year, the senior Muema allowed his house at Mwala, Machakos County to host DP’s offices.
Resignation
The former pilot and instructor at the defence staff college in Karen was urged to request his father to change his political decision. Unfortunately for the soldier, his father declined to follow his advice.
On March 24, 1993, Muema was called by one Col Vuvi (now deceased) and instructed that he should report to one Col Kunyiha who was the in charge of military police.
The month that followed saw him transferred from one police station to another without a single word of what the issue was.
On March 29, 1993, he was taken back to the defence staff college commandant who told him that he ought to resign as he was involved in crime and was soiling the government’s good name.
The commandant flushed out a resignation letter for Muema to sign but he declined.
Guns were drawn and he was given an option to either chose a pen or a bullet plus harming his family. Muema opted for the pen.
He narrated that this was not the end of his misery, as was charged seven times and at one point, in 2000, he was remanded at Kamiti Maximum Security Prison since robbery with violence was not a bailable offence.
In 2001, the younger Muema filed a court case seeking compensation for all the torture he underwent after he was forced to resign.
The Appeal
After 18 years, on Friday, August 30, 2019, Muema was victorious after the Court of Appeal awarded him Ksh6.4 million.
Court of Appeal judges Roselyn Nambuye, Asike Makhandia and William Ouko found malice in the number of unsuccessful criminal cases pressed against the soldier and an admission by an army officer who testified for the state that he had no clue of any criminal case Muema was involved in.
“The unsuccessful initiation of a large number of criminal cases based on the same facts and background leaves no doubt in our minds that there was malice, especially when no effort was made by the appellants to tender evidence in court to justify those prosecutions, as the witness tendered in support of their case was categorical in oath that he was not privy to the events that led to those prosecutions and knew nothing about it,” the judges ruled.
