CORRUPTION-KENYA: A Hard Nut to Crack

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Joyce Mulama

NAIROBI, Nov 13 2004 (IPS) - The government of President Mwai Kibaki is under pressure to make public the wealth of its officials as part of its commitment to fight corruption in Kenya.

Making it mandatory for public servants to declare their wealth would help control abuse of power and looting of government resources, civil society groups argue.

At a Nov. 11 meeting organised by the Berlin-based graft watchdog Transparency International (TI)-Kenya chapter, the government was urged to amend the law to publish assets of public servants annually. Publishing the assets would subject officials to public scrutiny and enhance accountability, campaigners argue.

‘’It makes no sense to have public servants declare their wealth then the information is kept under lock and key,’’ said Maina Kiai, chairman of the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights, a government-appointed body.

‘’We have a lot of good words and rhetoric from the government and we are not sure whether these will work,’’ he told the gathering in Kenya’s capital, Nairobi

In May 2003, the government introduced wealth declaration requirements into the Public Officer Ethics Act (POEA), which demands that all public officials from the president to messengers declare their income, assets and liabilities including those of their spouses and dependent children.

But campaigners are furious that the Act provides for asset declarations to be kept confidential. ‘’Public access to declarations facilitates public scrutiny of government and officials and promotes public confidence in the declaration system by the government,’’ Transparency International said.

Kenya is not the only country in Africa that requires wealth declaration by government officials. Uganda, Zambia and South Africa use various methods to make information available to the public. They publish the declarations in the official gazettes or in registers open to public inspection, while others release individual declarations to members of the public upon request, free of charge or at a minimal fee.

The Act is also unpopular with some members of parliament.

Paul Muite, chairman of Kenya’s Parliamentary Committee on Administration of Justice and Legal Affairs, says the Act contains heavy fines for those who defy it. ‘’The government Bill comes with a fine of two million shillings (about 25,000 dollars) for disclosures of assets. Making the declarations confidential has therefore defeated the purpose of the Bill,’’ he told the gathering.

Defending itself, the government says its hands are tied; two groups in parliament have divergent views on wealth declaration and public access to the graft record.

‘’When this issue came to the House, one group said ‘yes’ … to wealth declaration and making it public, while another rejected the idea of publishing assets of public servants, saying this would be a breach of one’s privacy, and would also compromise their personal security,’’ said Robinson Githae, assistant minister for Justice and Constitutional Affairs.

‘’We are pursuing the best approach, and we are soon coming up with a solution,’’ he added.

Kenyan laws deny the public access to information about government’s performance. ‘’How do you ensure that the government is held accountable by the public if there are all manner of laws making it difficult for them (public) to know actions of the government? Some of these laws have been used to silence corruption whistle blowers,’’ Kiai said.

The laws include the ‘Officials Secrets Act’, whose power was exercised in April when the head of public service and secretary to the cabinet Francis Muthaura issued a stern warning to civil servants against accessing classified information to the press. Officials who defy the directive would be suspended or expunged from the civil service.

The warning came after media highlighted corruption implicating government ministers in a deal (popularly known as Anglo-Leasing), in which more than 25 million dollars was awarded to a dubious foreign company for manufacture of terrorist-proof passports and construction of a forensic Criminal Investigations Department laboratory.

Finance minister David Mwiraria and his national security counterpart Chris Murungaru have been accused of involvement in the scam. Both men have denied the charges.

The government insists that it will not relent on the fight against corruption and boasts of instituting a number of measures to curb the practice. ‘’Among the first steps the government took upon coming to power was establishing the Goldenberg Commission to investigate a major corruption scandal in this country,’’ Githae explained.

President Kibaki came to power Dec. 31, 2002 on an anti-corruption platform. Early last year his government set up the Goldenberg Commission to investigate a scandal (popularly known as Goldenberg scandal) involving dubious exports of gold and diamonds from Kenya.

The scam, which took place in early 1990s, cost the country about 750 million dollars, according to Githae. This is nearly three times the loan given to Kenya by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) last November.

A number of government officials in the previous administration including former president Daniel arap Moi have been named in the Goldenberg scandal. Some officials in the present government have also been mentioned, including George Saitoti, Kibaki’s minister of education.

Despite pressure to sack those implicated in the corruption, the government says it prefers the law to take its course.

‘’This country respects the rule of the law which says someone is innocent until proven guilty. Investigations into these scandals including the Anglo-Leasing are going on and within one or two months we will be told who was actually involved. If there are credible evidence, these officials will be taken to court. Let us not crucify them before investigations are over,’’ Githae told IPS.

He says the government is not only conducting investigations into corruption scandals but also trying to speed up the process of pursuing stolen money stashed in foreign banks.

Last week the South African government offered to help Kenya trace some 3.75 billion dollars, and property, hidden in that country. It is believed that the money, most of it spirited out in the 1990s during former president Moi’s regime, was used to buy property.

Early this year, Justice and Constitutional Affairs minister Kiraitu Murungi, his Finance counterpart David Mwiraria and the Ethics and Governance permanent secretary John Githongo, traveled to London to try to recover stolen money.

According to Githae, Kenya has spent about two billion dollars between 2002 and 2004 to investigate corruption. The probe is being spearheaded by the Kenya Anti-Corruption Commission, established last year to clean up the East African country.

The body has already investigated 38 cases and forwarded them to the Attorney General’s office. According to Githae, ‘’lots of cases’’ involving key persons in government and business will follow soon. ‘’In the next two to three months, we expect to see a lot of prosecutions coming up including high-level ones,’’ he said.

Corruption is still being unearthed with the latest one being a recruitment fiasco early this week, in which the Kenya Wildlife Society (KWS) ended up employing 980 game ranger trainees instead of the required 460.

The extra 520 were recruited on recommendations of politicians after receiving bribes of about 625 dollars or more per recruit. Critics claim that 90 percent of the 520 trainees come from one province and were exonerated from the rigorous interviewing process, as demanded before admission.

Senior government ministers, including Murungaru and his tourism counterpart Raphael Tuju, have been implicated in the scandal. But Murungaru and Tuju have denied the allegations. So far, only the KWS director Evans Mukolwe has been suspended and further investigations into the scam are being conducted.