National Assembly speaker Moses Wetang’ula has taken a swipe at Kenyan lawyers who were deported from Tanzania on May 18, 2025 and May 19, 2025.
In a strongly-worded statement, while addressing members of the public in Bungoma County on Friday, May 30, 2025, Wetang’ula said that the lawyers were out of order to travel to Tanzania.
“I want to urge my fellow Kenyans, who have started a bad habit of roaming all over East Africa to go and foment trouble, disaffection, and to appear to know what they think the others do not know,” Wetang’ula said.
“You are a lawyer in Kenya, yet a look at your record shows no distinction in this country; and then you go to Tanzania to show them that you are a lawyer while no one in Kenya appreciates what you do as a lawyer.”
Wetang’ula observed that peace in the region is vital to keeping the cordial and business relations between Kenya and her neighbours.
“The East African Community (EAC) is not a community of flags and presidents but a community of the East African people started by our founding fathers Jomo Kenyatta, Mwalimu Julius Nyerere and Milton Obote of Uganda,” the speaker said.
“Kenya wants to be at peace and have good neighbourliness with our partners in the East African Community. Tanzanians have never picked a fight with Kenyans before this,” Wetang’ula observed.
Cautions retired justices
He indicated that more Kenyans are living in Tanzania and Uganda than there are natives of those countries living in Kenya.
“We do not want to continue bickering with our neighbours, and I want to encourage our retired chief justices and other distinguished Kenyans; please don’t be the ones to forment frosty relations between Kenya and her neighbours,” he noted.
“We co-exist, trade and have more Kenyans living in those countries than their people living in Kenya.”
Tanzania has cautioned its neighbours in Uganda and Kenya, from meddling in its internal matters, with the President urging border control officers to be on the lookout.
Deportation drama
On Sunday, May 18, 2025, former Justice Minister Martha Karua was deported alongside two other lawyers, Lynn Ngugi and Gloria Kimani, after they were denied entry to attend a court case of the jailed opposition politician in the country, Tundu Lissu.
The following day, activists Hanifa Farsafi and Hussein Khalid were equally barred from entering Tanzania alongside former Chief Justice Willy Mutunga.
They were later deported while the immediate former Chief Justice, David Maraga, was granted entrance to the country and access to be present during the treason case against Lissu.
Activist Boniface Mwangi, who had been granted permission to enter the country alongside her Ugandan counterpart Agather Atuhaire, were picked up from their hotel rooms, detained and deported after days of what they called torture and degrading experiences.
President William Ruto has since apologised for the presence of the Kenyans in Tanzania, and his apology was accepted by the country’s parliament.
