POLITICS-KENYA:
Corrupt Officials May Escape Justice
Joyce Mulama
NAIROBI, Aug 3 (IPS) - This week's court ruling clearing former education minister George Saitoti of any wrongdoing in Kenya's Goldenberg scandal has raised fears that other key suspects may follow in Saitoti's footsteps and exonerate themselves from the scandal.
Handing its landmark ruling Aug. 2, Kenya's High Court said Saitoti should not be charged in connection with the Goldenberg scandal, the country's biggest financial fraud. Kenya lost close to one billion dollars in the scandal which involved a fake scheme for the export of gold and diamonds by a company called Goldenberg International.
Saitoti filed a suit in court seeking to have his name removed from a report of the Goldenberg Commission of Inquiry, which was investigating the scandal that took place in the early 1990s. Saitoti, who was vice president and finance minister at the time, was adversely mentioned in the report together with some senior colleagues of his in the government.
The ruling said Saitoti had acted according to procedure when he approved a payment to Goldenberg International. It also said that Attorney-General Amos Wako had cleared Saitoti of wrongdoing in a statement he had presented to parliament over a decade ago..
The court further ruled that all paragraphs that adversely mention Saitoti be removed from the report. ''Like guided missiles hit only the target, let this order have the same effect by hitting only the targeted paragraphs which are in relation to (Saitoti),'' said the order from the three-judge bench.
Established in 2003, the Goldenberg Commission of inquiry, led by Justice Samuel Bosire, handed over the report to the government early this year, after which Saitoti went to court. The report recommends, among other things, prosecution of those implicated in the corruption scandal.
Following the release of the report, public pressure ensued, prompting Saitoti to resign as education minister in the current administration.
The Goldenberg scandal falls among the massive corruption cases that have put President Mwai Kibaki under pressure to honour his pledge of fighting graft. He came to power December 2002 on an anti-corruption platform.
But with the quashing of the report, many see it as a setback to the fight against corruption, with fears simmering that other key persons mentioned in the report may follow in Saitoti's footsteps, and escape justice.
''The impact of the ruling is going to be very far reaching. Everybody else in the report will try to go to court. The message this sends is that people can do anything and be able to get away with it,'' Maina Kiai, the chairperson of the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights, an independent governmentûappointed human rights watchdog, told IPS.
''Absolutely, the ruling will have ramifications on other Goldenberg-related cases,'' he stressed.
Already, Wilfred Koinange, former Treasury permanent secretary, has gone to court to have his name cleared from the scandal. He was also named in the report.
In addition, Eric Kotut, former Central Bank governor, has managed to temporarily prevent the government from arresting him in connection with the Goldenberg affair.
As fears over the implications of this week's ruling abound, the government says it is still studying the ruling. Martha Karua, the Justice and Constitutional Affairs minister, said Aug. 1 that Attorney-General Wako would study the ruling before advising the government on what course of action to take.
It remains to be seen how the government will handle the Goldenberg affair. So far, anti-graft groups do not want to discuss the matter. ''I do not want to make any comments on that,'' Nicholas Simani, the senior public relations officer at the Kenya Anti-Corruption Commission, told IPS. His organisation investigates corruption-related issues.
It's not the first time that recommendations of a government-appointed commission of inquiry have been challenged by a court of law.
Nicholas Biwott, a former minister in the regime of ex-president Daniel arap Moi, successfully challenged the recommendations of a judicial commission charged to investigate ethnic clashes that took place in 1992 and 1997 respectively. He got his name removed from the commission's report.
Chaired by Justice Akilano Akiwumi, the commission, appointed in 1998, handed its report to Moi in 1999, adversely mentioning Biwott.
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