The release of the new design banknotes launched last weekend has been challenged in court.
Activist Okiya Omtatah and East African Legislative Assembly MP Simon Mbugua have in separate petitions moved to court in a bid to block the circulation of the new currency notes.
They both want the court to stop the circulation of the notes pending the hearing and determination of the petition.
Omtatah wants the court to bar CBK from circulating or giving effect in any way whatsoever to the new generation banknotes launched by the President and the governor of the Central Bank during the 56th Madaraka Day celebrations at Narok Stadium, Narok county.
Both argue that the CBK did not involve the public in the printing and unveiling of the new notes.
They also say the portrait of the first president of Kenya on the notes contravenes the Constitution.
Omtatah is aggrieved that contrary to the Constitution which decrees that Kenyan currency banknotes shall not bear the portrait of any individual, each new generation Kenyan banknote bears a prominently displayed portrait of the late President Jomo Kenyatta.
According to the activist, by putting a picture of his full statue which is erected in front of the Kenyatta International Conference Centre in every note, the CBK simply used architectural masterpiece that is the KICC to sneak the portrait of Mzee Kenyatta onto the banknotes.
“There are several architectural perspectives that courts have been used to present the KICC-tower, amphitheatre and podium-without dragging the statue of the late President Kenyatta to the foreground,” he argues.
Omtatah argues that it was the people’s express wish during the Constitution of the Kenya review to disassociate imagery on Kenyan money with any individual.
He says the symbolism of retaining the portrait on the notes works to reinforce the falsified and highly embellished association of the history of Kenya with the family of Mzee Kenyatta.
“Especially when it is constantly reinforced in the subconscious by the association of Jomo Kenyatta with the country’s currency, money being something valuable to the cherished and protected.”
The activist has also accused CBK of lying that the currency was issued vide the Gazette Notice of May 31 as "no such gazette notice exists at the government printer".
