Kenyan authorities defied a court order to lift a ban on three private television stations and briefly detained an opposition figure on Friday, setting the scene for a new confrontation between the judiciary and Uhuru Kenyatta’s government.

Miguna Miguna, who has declared himself a “general” of the opposition’s National Resistance Movement, was detained in a dawn raid on his Nairobi home, and later released on bail of 50,000 Kenyan shillings (£350).

He had stood alongside opposition leader Raila Odinga at a symbolical inauguration ceremony on Tuesday, which was described by government lawyers as an act of treason.

Authorities cut live transmission of the country’s top three TV channels to prevent coverage of the ceremony and later declared the NRM an organised criminal group meaning members could face imprisonment up to 10 years.

The tensions come three months after Kenyatta won a further five-year term in a rerun that was triggered when the supreme court annulled the result of the presidential election in August because of irregularities.



Kenyatta won the rerun with 98% of the vote, but turnout was only 39% after the opposition boycotted the poll, saying it was neither free nor fair.

Odinga dismissed the October election as “fake” and the supreme court was again asked to dismiss the result, but this time upheld Kenyatta’s victory.



This week’s arrests and broadcast bans are a shock to Kenyans who have grown used to the free-wheeling media and irreverent political culture that have grown since decades of autocratic rule ended in 2002.

The government’s failure to act on a court order over the TV ban raises questions about the rule of law in the country.

Okiya Omtatah, an activist who secured the ruling, said it had not been served on Thursday afternoon because of a delay at the court registrar’s office. The order was also published in Friday’s edition of the Standard newspaper, one of Kenya’s largest dailies. When he tried to serve it to Kenya’s communications authority on Friday, they refused to receive it.

“I am insisting on delivering this order,” Omtatah told Reuters news agency. “It’s an abuse of power. The laws are clear. That’s why the court ruled as they did.”

The office of the UN high commissioner for human rights in Geneva said it was concerned at the government’s “attempts to interfere with the rights to freedom of expression”.

On Thursday, the opposition politician who administered Odinga’s “oath”, Tom Kajwang, was released on bail a day after his arrest.