Document #1218048
IRB – Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada (Author)
1) The Penal Code of Kenya contains Article
57(2) which deals with "possession of a seditious publication" and
Article 57(1) dealing with "distribution of a seditious
publication". Amnesty International in its publication, Kenya:
Torture, Political Detention and Unfair Trials, writes that
since March 1986 there have been over 75 trials in Kenya of people
accused of political offences, many of them in connection with
Mwakenya. [Amnesty International, Kenya: Torture, Political
Detention and Unfair Trials, (London: Amnesty International,
1987), p.25.] Those convicted under Article 57(2) (which carries a
maximum sentence of seven years' imprisonment) received prison
sentences of four or five years. Those convicted under Article
57(1) (which carries a maximum ten-year prison sentence) were
imprisoned for five or six years. The IRB Documentation Centre does
not hold a copy of the Penal Code of Kenya, and we are unable to
supply you with a copy of the text of Article 57.
2) Please see the attached copy of the
response prepared earlier this year in response to the same
question. We have no information in the IRB Documentation Centre
concerning IRB decisions which were favourable to Muslims from
Kenya.
3) We have no information on the Muslim Youth Movement in
Kenya.
4) See p.569 from Africa South of the Sahara 1989 and pp.
5-6 of Kenya: Torture, Political Detention and Unfair
Trials, attached, for a description of the Mwakenya and its
members.