Kacc boss grilled over graft war

Parliament’s Budget Committee on Thursday grilled Kenya’s anti-corruption chief, Prof Patrick Lumumba, over his performance in fighting graft.

Prof Lumumba, who marks one year at the helm of the Kenya Anti Corruption Commission (KACC) in a fortnight, was hard-pressed to explain the progress of investigations into the multi-billion scandals, before the House team approved Sh1.6 billion budgetary allocation for the current fiscal year.

Besides, the MPs asked Prof Lumumba to “quantify his achievements” in the fight against corruption and show that he was efficient in handling the spread of the vice in the country.

“You’ve told us that more resources are required. We ask for what; in what order?” asked committee chairman Elias Mbau.

The Goldenberg scandal, the Anglo-leasing scandal, the Sh4.2 billion Free Primary Education scam and the Sh1.1 billion Tokyo embassy scandal are some of the major cases that the MPs wanted explained before they approved the Sh1.6 billion that KACC has been allocated to it in the current budget.

The chairman of the Agriculture Committee, Mr John Mututho, told Prof Lumumba that there were dozens of parliamentary reports exposing corruption in government; yet even with that, KACC was taking a long time to nail the suspects.

“Nzoia Sugar lost Sh20 billion to corruption. That has not been investigated. To my surprise, Sh4.4 billion has been allocated to the company and that is money that you could have been given to do another work. Why is that happening?” posed Mr Mututho.

The MPs alluded to a waning public confidence in the KACC chief following what they termed as "an apparent failure to nab the big fish in the country, after close to twelve months in office."

They took issue with Prof Lumumba’s participation in public protests against corruption saying he ought not to be joining in public condemnation of corrupt officials, but should instead focus on gathering evidence.

“I’ve seen you in the media challenging the Minister of Education to resign. Is it for the director of KACC to condemn anyone, when he has the opportunity, unlike everyone else in the country, to investigate and recommend for prosecution,” posed Mr Ekwee Ethuro, the chairman of Parliament’s committee on Constituency Development Fund.

Mr James Rege, the chairman of Parliament’s Committee on Energy and Communication together with Mr Danson Mungatana (Garsen) questioned why KACC had not factored in devolution in its budget, given that lots of money will be devolved to the counties.

“A lot of us want to be governors in the counties, I don’t know why, but may be, we’re looking at the big money that it is going to be there,” said Mr Rege.

The KACC boss defended the anti-graft body saying it was working overtime to prosecute all the cases and that once the new law giving the body prosecutorial powers comes into force, then it will be easier for the authority to expedite the fight against corruption.

Dr Julius Kones, the chairman of the Public Accounts Committee said the budget for rentals at Sh67 million was too high and the money need not to be spent on rentals.

“The public goodwill is waning. We’d really love to see the commission going beyond the rhetoric, beyond the public relations in tackling real issues,” added Mr Ababu Namwamba, the chairman of the Justice and Legal Affairs Committee.

All chairmen of the House Committees sit in the Budget Committee together with 15 other MPs.

KACC was the last public body to defend its budget before the Budget committee.

Having laid their case, Prof Lumumba said KACC was competent to handle the cases and that it had covered so much ground only that whatever milestones it made were the “quiet non-juicy things that the press will never cover.”

He denied losing steam in the pursuit of Anglo-leasing, Goldenberg and Tokyo scandals saying the reporter misunderstood the word ‘closure’.

“The reporter did not understand English. I said the cases should be brought to closure, it doesn’t mean you close the cases, it means you expedite the progress (of investigations and prosecution of the suspects and recover the assets),” Prof Lumumba told MPs.

He added that he was not ashamed to march the streets in solidarity with groups protesting against corruption.

“What I did should be done more. I hold the view that the person at the head of the organisation should be out of the desk. There’s a time when you must dramatise your anger. All whom I love, Mahatma Gandhi, was eternally in the streets and so was Christ of Nazareth,” the KACC boss said. “It is very likely that you’ll see me on the streets more often as I seek to educate the masses.”

He said KACC was working with foreign countries to recover stolen assets stashed abroad, but this process was hampered because Kenya has no mechanism for mutual legal assistance.

“Take the Tokyo case as an example; we completed the local component long time ago, but the investigation is still on. We sent a request for mutual legal assistance, the Japanese said we have to write it in Japanese. We did that and a week ago they said it will take one more month to look at the papers in order to allow you to come to Japanese territory to investigate,” said Prof Lumumba.