Kenya’s finance minister, 27 others arrested over multimillion Dollars fraud
By Agency report
Henry Rotich, the Finance Minister of Kenya and other treasury officials were arrested Monday on corruption and fraud charges over a multi-million dollar project to build two mega dams, police said.
According to Agency report, Director of Public Prosecutions Noordin Haji had ordered the arrest and prosecution of Rotich and 27 other top officials on charges of fraud, abuse of office and financial misconduct in the latest scandal to rock graft-wracked Kenya.
Rotich, his principal secretary and the chief executive of Kenya’s environmental authority then presented themselves to the police. They are in custody now waiting to be taken to court,” Police Chief George Kinoti was quoted in the report to have told AFP.
“We are looking for (the) others and they will all go to court.”
Haji said the conception, procurement and payment processes for the dam project — part of a bid to improve water supply in the drought-prone country — was “riddled with irregularities”.
“Investigations established that government officials flouted all procurement rules and abused their oath of office to ensure the scheme went through,” said Haji.
He pointed to the awarding of the contract to Italian firm CMC di Ravenna in a manner that he said flouted proper procurement procedures, and despite financial woes that forced the company into liquidation and had led to it failing complete three other mega-dam projects.
