KRA staff ‘tamper with system’

Kenya Revenue Authority officials routinely shut down servers to engage in corrupt activities, a parliamentary committee has been told.

A police officer attached to the Mombasa port told the parliamentary committee investigating the cost of living that after the online cargo clearance system is disabled, clearance of cargo is manual, which is easier to manipulate.

This allows entry of contraband goods and operation of tax evasion schemes, the witness said.

“This happens especially on Fridays so that the tax evasion cartels can carry on with illegal business over the weekend.

“During one of the incidents, we found the servers at the port switched off,” the officer said on condition of anonymity.

The committee chaired by Budalang’i MP Ababu Namwamba was listening to submissions by the Kenya Transport Association (KTA) executive committee, which blamed bureaucracy within the Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA), Kenya Bureau of Standards and Kenya Ports Authority for delays.

When KRA’s Simba system is down, cargo movement at the port is slow, resulting in a massive backlog. KRA attributed the breakdown to upgrading that it was carrying out.

Two weeks ago, shipping lines calling at the port of Mombasa threatened to impose charges on imported goods due to the unusual delays in offloading containers from the ships.

It takes some ships more than 10 days from the time of arrival at the port to have their containers offloaded, a period said to be long enough to justify introduction of a Vessel Delay Surcharge (VDS).

“If such a charge is levied on maize for instance, the millers will pass on the cost to the consumer.

“These are some of the factors contributing to skyrocketing prices of commodities,” transport association organising secretary Lucas Gidi said.

Mr Namwamba said the accusations would be pursued at a “higher” level.

“It is sickening that greedy individuals can resort to these manoeuvres with the intention of evading tax and bringing contraband goods into the country,” he said.

“We cannot allow this to continue and we will do everything in our capacity to ensure that this is stopped.

“If such system failures can cause losses and be responsible for the increasing cost of living, then something must be done as a matter of urgency.”