Willis Otieno slams Senate after Mutai walks free in impeachment battle
Lawyer and political commentator Willis Otieno has taken issue with the Senate’s handling of the impeachment proceedings against Kericho Governor Erick Mutai, accusing the House of turning a blind eye to the county’s woes.
Mutai, who has now survived another impeachment attempt, walked out of the Senate chambers on Friday, August 29, 2025, a free man after a tense and closely followed process ended in his favour.
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In a statement posted on his X account on Saturday, August 30, 2025, Otieno argued that the Senate had failed in its oversight role by allowing Mutai to escape accountability despite what he described as glaring evidence of poor leadership in Kericho.
According to him, the House dismissed the charges on technical grounds, focusing on procedural gaps in the County Assembly’s case instead of addressing the substantive issues raised against the governor.
He further suggested that the decision reflected a pattern of shielding powerful figures through legal loopholes and questionable influences, rather than prioritising the interests of residents who continue to suffer under ineffective governance.
“Y’all don’t dispute that Kericho is sinking under his mismanagement; you only claim that the Assembly didn’t dot the i’s and cross the t’s in drafting the charges. So why did the case even reach the Senate if you knew you’d sanitise him with technicalities greased by brown envelopes?” he posed.
Hearing
The Senate reached its decision after three days of marathon hearings. By a majority vote, 26 senators ruled that the County Assembly of Kericho had not met the legal threshold required to remove the governor. Sixteen senators voted that the threshold had been met, while one abstained.
At the centre of the dispute was whether Members of the County Assembly had secured the two-thirds majority needed to impeach the governor. The Assembly maintained that 33 out of 47 members supported the motion. However, Mutai’s legal team challenged the credibility of the electronic voting system used, arguing that it was insecure and could have been accessed by unauthorised individuals.
Some MCAs testified that they had not cast votes for the impeachment and had not been trained to use the system, casting doubt on the validity of the results. Although an ICT expert told senators that the system was sound and secure, the majority sided with Mutai’s claims and dismissed the motion.
The County Assembly had accused Governor Mutai of abuse of office, financial impropriety, illegal dismissals, and authorising fictitious payments.
This is the second time in less than a year that the governor has survived an impeachment attempt on procedural grounds. In October 2024, the Senate also threw out a motion against him after finding that the Assembly had only secured 31 votes, one short of the constitutional requirement of 32.
