Today is a moment of national reflection.
Sixteen years ago, Kenyans promulgated a new Constitution. It was not a gift from the powerful, but a hard- fought assertion of our sovereign will, the victory from years of struggle and sacrifice.
Today, that Constitution is under siege from incessant violations that must trouble every Kenyan who lived through the struggle.
The lesson from the past 16 years is unambiguous: we must stand and defend it. We must be vigilant because those who want to sabotage it are working overtime.
The Bill of Rights and the provision for public participation are the soul of our supreme law, the built-in mechanisms by which the framers sought to guarantee limited government and an accountable state. Yet these very protections continue to be eroded through cosmetic implementation and repressive actions: the criminalization of dissent, the disregard of court orders, the treatment of public participation as a formality to be endured rather than a constitutional obligation to be honoured.
Even more troubling is the failure of Parliament to perform its constitutional role as a check on executive power. An institution meant to scrutinize, question, and, where necessary, restrain the Executive has regressed from oversight to acquiescence. The result is a widening space for executive overreach and, more gravely, the entrenchment of what can only be described as state capture, where public institutions serve narrow interests rather than the sovereign people in whose name they exist.
And hence the need for greater vigilance. When the institutions designed to hold those in power accountable fail, the burden shifts back to citizens, to civil society, to the judiciary, and to every Kenyan because constitutionalism is not self-executing.
This is why the 2027 elections will be more than a contest between candidates. It will be a referendum on the kind of country we desire; a choice between those who believe in constitutionalism as the framework for our shared security and relics of resurgent past despotism dressed in the form of progress. Kenyans must approach that choice with the same clarity and courage that produced this Constitution in the first place.
Katiba Day is a reminder of what was won. It must also be a warning about what could still be lost.
Chief Justice Emeritus David Maraga is the United Green Movement (UGM) Party co-leader and 2027 Presidential flag bearer.
