Cast iron? I think not.

The legislative authority of the Republic is derived from the people and, at the national level, is vested in and exercised by Parliament. ~ Article 94(1)

1. Executive Authority derives from the people of Kenya and shall be exercised in accordance with this Constitution. 2. Executive authority shall be exercised in a manner compatible with the principle of service to the people of Kenya, and for their well-being and benefit.~ Article 129

The national executive of the Republic comprises the President, the Deputy President and the rest of the Cabinet. ~ Article 130(1)

Judicial authority is derived from the people and vests in, and shall be exercised by, the courts and tribunals established by or under this Constitution. ~ Article 159(1)

That, in essence, is the separation of powers in the constitutional scheme we promulgated for ourselves in 2010, three years after neighbour set neighbour's house on fire, committed beastly acts against neighbour, and murdered, rampaged and pillaged like a marauding hyena in a pack of fellow hyenas.

The checks and balances part would take a keener reading of the Constitution. Take public finances; you would think that with the financial autonomy of the three arms of governemnt, things would finally be simpler. But it is the national executive, through the Kenya Revenue Authority, that has the authority to collect taxes nationally, which, in turn, become the national revenue, not only to be shared shared between the two levels of government but among the three arms of government. The sharing, ironically, is done by Parliament, even though it does so based on the very strong recommendations of the national executive through the National Treasury, the Commission on Revenue Allocation, the Auditor-General, the Controller of Budget and the Kenya Revenue Authority.

Or, think of the "judicial authority vested in and exercised by courts and tribunals" and remember that when the Judiciary decrees something, the only institution with the coercive power to enforce the decree is the national executive through its police or its agencies with police powers. The Judiciary can pass a sentence of imprisonment for life, but it is the Kenya Prisons Service that will actually enforce it; the Judiciary does not run its own prisons.

What about Parliament, you ask? Can it really do what it is threatening to do without seriously jeopardising the constitutional scheme of things? It all depends on whether you believe that Parliament is primus inter pares or not. Twice now, parliament, in the guise of the Senate, has been thwarted by the Supreme Court when it came to the impeachment of the Governor of Embu County. More recently, it emerges that without the intervention of the Chief of Staff of the President, a functionary who appears nowhere in the constitutional scheme of things, Parliament would be without lights today as the President of the United Republic of Tanzania came to give his address before the National Assembly.

Ignore the bombast and rhetoric of the one who would have you believe that the Constitution is cast in cast iron, immutable to the laws of politics and human emotion. As with every other human relationship, this document we tend to venerate, is subject to compromises that would seek to make it smoother to read and live by. Sometimes it is the national executive and the Judiciary ganging up against Parliament; sometimes it is the national executive and Parliament taking on the Judiciary; and sometimes it is the Judiciary seeing the wisdom of not standing in Parliament's way as it confronts the national executive. 

So long as mad men do not spill onto the streets with simis, rungus, guns, Molotov cocktail and hatred for their fellowman in their hearts, this is the best constitution scheme that we have at the moment and it is in our best interests to see that the compromises and accommodations are not against the "well-being and benefit" of the people.