Maize scandal: Briefcase agents profit

On June 27, 2008, Agriculture permanent secretary Romano Kiome told a workshop at Gigiri, Nairobi, that Kenya had eight million bags of maize in store at that time.

Of that, he told the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) meeting, three million bags were in the emergency store called the Strategic Grain Reserve, which the country relies on in times of scarcity.

On Wednesday this week, Agriculture minister William Ruto told parliament that the maize in the stores at around that time was 2.6 million bags, 1.7 million in the emergency stores and 847,000 bags which the cereals board was free to trade with.

By November of last year the maize stock had collapsed to 1.2 million bags. The exact amount of maize bought with tax money, the manner in which it was sold, exposing 10 million Kenyans to starvation, is the subject of the current controversy.

At a time of need, the grain from the emergency stores is supposed to be sold to millers and distributed as relief. It is now alleged that well-connected profiteers bought maize from the emergency stores at Sh1,750 a bag and sold it to millers at Sh2,600.

Since the National Cereals and Produce Board would not sell to millers and they had to have maize to stay in business, they bought the expensive maize and passed on the additional cost to the consumer. This led to the increase in the price of maize flour from Sh55 to Sh130 in a matter of months.

Inquiries show that brokers had little notes or phone calls were made to NCPB from the ministry, allocating them maize. Once the allocation was done, the broker would go to a specific depot in the company of a willing miller.

The miller would write two cheques, one for NCPB at Sh1,750 a bag and the other, at Sh850 a bag, to the broker.