DPP Tobiko orders prosecution of Murang’a governor, two MPs

Murang’a Governor Mwangi wa Iria will be prosecuted for allegedly swearing a false declaration in 2012 and submitting it to anti-corruption authorities.

Director of Public Prosecution Keriako Tobiko has agreed with the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission’s recommendation to prosecute wa Iria in a review of ten corruption case files forwarded to his office.

Also to appear in court are Members of Parliament Alfred Keter (Nandi Hills) and Sonia Birdi (nominated) for breaches of the Ethics and Integrity Act, and Chapter Six of the Constitution, during an incident in which they confronted police and staff at the Gilgil weighbridge.

The Office of the DPP announced Monday that Mr Tobiko has decided on seven of the ten files received from EACC but was still reviewing the remaining three. The announcement appears to contradict a claim made on Friday by EACC chief executive Halakhe Waqo that the anti-graft body has so far submitted 25 files to the DPP’s technical team.

Recommendations for charges against various accused in five of the cases were accepted, as was EACC’s decision to close one file involving the alleged misappropriation of a Sh16 million grant to the Industrialisation ministry.

Tobiko rejected EACC’s recommendation that a case involving a Sh245 million NSSF contract to supply CCTV cameras and access control systems be “closed for lack of evidence”. Instead, he called for further investigations into the contract was awarded to Microcity Computers.

The pending files include one on whether the purchase of a Sh168 million home for Kilifi Governor Amason Kingi was irregular.

EACC has only about a dozen working days left to the end of a 60-day deadline to work through the 124 cases that produced the 175-person ‘List of Shame’ its chief executive had presented to the President shortly before this year’s State of the Nation address.

-businessdailyafrica.co.ke