Why LSK's Faith Odhiambo should not have taken new task
Opinion
By
Mike Nyagwoka
| Sep 07, 2025
I still believe LSK President Faith Odhiambo should have declined her appointment to the Panel of Experts on Compensation of Victims of Public Protests and Demonstrations. The day I learnt of her appointment, I got extremely conflicted on her behalf.
I tried to play out all scenarios, but there was only one conclusion: Faith would be out of place in that panel and the reasons are obvious. Faith has built a solid record as a human rights defender ever since she rose into her prominent position. She has been in the thick of things—trailing abductees, rushing to court, securing bail, attending post-mortems.
By her own admission, she would get calls in the dead of the night and, being the diligent servant, she would respond either in person or by proxy. In the process, she became, without a shadow of doubt, the heroine of protest victims. How now do we reconcile that with her new status as a member of a State House formed entity meant to compensate the very same victims?
Yes, monetary compensation is a form of compensatory justice but the Kenyan scenario demands more. In fact, I would argue it is the least form of justice in this context. The entity that bears greatest responsibility for the injustices meted out on protest victims, many of whom are dead and buried, is the State. That same State cannot be entrusted with initiating and running the compensation process, including appointing members to a panel. If that is the case, then there is no need for the panel at all. The President should simply compensate victims directly.
If the route of a Panel of Experts was truly necessary, then the responsibility should have fallen on the Kenya National Human Rights Commission (KNCHR), working with other bodies, to design a framework that pursues not just compensatory but also retributive justice. After all, most of those who died during protests died by the bullet. Some incidents were caught on camera, others documented in detail. Yet nothing is moving in the courts to deliver justice to victims’ families.
READ MORE
AI makes mistakes, journalists told
Kenya nurtures youth to harness cultural tourism's hidden wealth
Sh258 billion Chinese-built airport opens in Cambodia amid eviction row
12 banks face merger over Sh20b capital crunch
Procurement experts back rollout of e-system amid supplier outcry
Why pending bills could double Kenya's budget deficit under new system
Overdraft facility increases by Sh27 billion on low interest regime
How businesses can navigate new tax loss restrictions
Motor firm launches engine rebuild centre in Nairobi
Experts call for new strategies to address youth unemployment
But again, why Faith? Why single her out when the State knows she represents a larger institution—the LSK? Why not simply ask the LSK to nominate a representative, rather than handpick its President? Clearly, this was an attempt to validate a process already tainted by official utterances and expressions that have shown little hint of regret.
I don’t doubt Faith’s unwavering fidelity to the rule of law. What I doubt is the space she is being asked to operate in. It is a space that will demand compromise rather than activism. In her statement, she outlined four priorities: identifying unreported victims, publishing and memorialising victims, expediting criminal prosecutions, and proposing legislative amendments. Noble paths, yes but all these can be done without a panel. We already have commissions and Parliament mandated to handle them. What is missing is political goodwill.
By accepting this role, Faith risks becoming a shield for the very State that victims hold responsible. The appointment is a trap. It blurs her legacy as a defender of rights and risks reducing her to an accessory in a cosmetic process.
-nyagwokamike@gmail.com