MPs reject EACC presentation on complaints against IEBC

Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission chairman Philip Kinisu (left) confers with CEO Halakhe Waqo when the two appeared before the Joint Select Committee on electoral reforms at Parliament in Nairobi on July 25, 2016. PHOTO | SALATON NJAU | NATION MEDIA

What you need to know:

  • The decision to send the team away for a more detailed report was announced by co-chairmen James Orengo and Kiraitu Murungi, and came after debate in the committee and with the EACC team led by chairman Philip Kinisu and chief executive officer Halakhe Waqo.
  • Cord MPs were initially excited by the documents presented by the EACC, with Senator Boni Khalwale (Kakamega, UDF) asking the commission to confirm whether some commissioners had been named in the documents handed over to the AG by the UK’s Serious Fraud Office and why they had been cleared.
  • EACC deputy CEO Michael Mubea said the document from the United Kingdom’s Serious Fraud Office is in the file with the DPP on Chickengate and could not in any case be shared.

An Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) team was on Monday sent away from the Joint Select Committee on electoral reforms for a second time after its presentation on allegations against the electoral commission was deemed shoddy.

There was also heated debate between the team of lawmakers and a senior staffer at the commission after he said the team could not be given a document on the Chickengate saga given to Kenyan authorities by the United Kingdom’s Serious Fraud Office.

The decision to send the team away for a more detailed report was announced by co-chairmen James Orengo and Kiraitu Murungi, and came after debate in the committee and with the EACC team led by chairman Philip Kinisu and chief executive officer Halakhe Waqo.

“We are sending you back and we want you to be relevant. Don’t just bring to us a mass of documents which have no relation to what we are trying to get at. Look at the commissioners, look at the secretariat, look at the documents you are bringing to us so that they are specific,” said Mr Murungi.

CHICKENGATE DOSSIER

Mr Murungi had earlier ruled that the two political coalitions would be asked to affirm their commitment to the process after the Jubilee alliance complained about Cord chief Raila Odinga's statements that Jubilee said undermine the committee’s work.

“The Right Honourable Raila Odinga is not any other jobless Kenyan speaking from his house. He had a key role to play in the formation of this joint committee... We as a committee will engage the Right Honourable Raila Odinga.

"We shall also engage the President as the leader of the Jubilee coalition so that we can know that at the  end of this process, we’ll have their support.

"I think when Cord comes to meet us and when the Jubilee coalition also comes, that is the time we’ll seek the confirmation Senator Murkomen wants,” said Mr Murungi.

When the EACC officials met the committee last week, they were asked to bring the Chickengate dossier to the committee.

VALUE OF REPORT QUESTIONED

Their presentation on Monday had detailed the 30 allegations made against the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) after the 2013 General Election.

Only four have been concluded, said Mr Kinisu, and only in three cases has the Director of Public Prosecutions agreed with the commission’s recommendations.

“I’m not confident that these 26 (remaining) cases will be completed by the time we go to elections and its (the report) value is not as high as expected,” said Mr Kinisu. 

The report on the Chickengate scandal was last week handed over to the DPP for consideration and he is yet to make a decision.

In no case has the prosecution of a commissioner been recommended.

Cord MPs were initially excited by the documents presented by the EACC, with Senator Boni Khalwale (Kakamega, UDF) asking the commission to confirm whether some commissioners had been named in the documents handed over to the AG by the UK’s Serious Fraud Office and why they had been cleared.

BAD DECISIONS

Dr Khalwale also pointed out that in the EACC presentation, it had been alleged that the commissioners failed to do their job when they cleared Taraiya ole Kores to run for Kajiado governor in 2013 though his academic qualifications were doubtful.

Makueni Senator Mutula Kilonzo Jr also referred to a decision by the Public Procurement Administrative Review Board on the procurement of the Biometric Voter Registration equipment he said showed that commissioners made a bad decision.

Sensing that Cord would use the EACC allegations to back a decision to remove the IEBC through a petition, Gatundu South MP Moses Kuria asked that the committee take time to study the documents presented by Mr Kinisu and his team and then call them back.

Elgeyo-Marakwet Senator Kipchumba Murkomen then questioned the veracity of the EACC allegations.

“What weight are we going to give to mere allegations? Senator Khalwale has referred to these issues and you find one saying that The Standard newspaper reports...then they say pending investigations. Look at such an allegation,” he said, pointing out the specifics of the allegations. 

He described the submission as worse than the work of a learner.

ALLEGATIONS TOO BROAD

Mr Orengo and Mr Murungi then backed the suggestion that the committee take more time to study the documents, but after looking at them some more they argued that the allegations were so broad and unsubstantiated that they were not satisfactory.

“I would like the EACC to be sent back because they have done something lawyers are familiar with, where if you can’t convince them, confuse them. They have confused us. When you come to us, tell us the allegations against the chairman are this and that, that this member of the secretariat did X and Y...Please don’t confuse us. If there are none, tell us there are none,” said Mr Murungi.

Mr Murungi also described his ejection from the Cabinet in 2006 after his name came up in the Anglo Leasing scandal while Mr Murkomen described the mass resignations and sackings after the EACC produced the List of Shame in 2015 as a bad precedent.

“An intern cannot even do the job you have done. My intern in the office cannot do this kind of job of picking names of people from wherever they’ve heard, put it here without going through basic credible positions,” said Mr Murkomen.

EACC deputy CEO Michael Mubea said the document from the United Kingdom’s Serious Fraud Office is in the file with the DPP on Chickengate and could not in any case be shared.

KURIA: DON'T HARASS EACC

“Sharing evidence with this committee at this deliberative stage may jeopardise the ongoing case. What we are trying to protect is information that has come specifically to us. We have even given commitments to the foreign agencies that this information will only be used for investigative purposes,” he argued.

But the lawmakers said the argument was not proper.

When Attorney-General Githu Muigai met the committee last week, he said he would get the document from the EACC and send it with others to the committee.

Mr Kuria took the EACC's side and argued: “Given that the document is already with the DPP, who was here earlier and we let him go away, I consider it an act of harassment to the EACC to keep asking for it.”

But Dr Khalwale, Junet Mohamed (Suna East, ODM) and Mr Orengo argued for its submission on the basis that the committee could look at its contents behind closed doors and could demand for it under the powers Parliament is granted by the Constitution.

“This document already contains a lot of prejudice,” said Mr Orengo, in reference to the EACC submission. “You are a constitutional body and you can’t give us a report that is simply based on allegations.”

(Editing by Joel Muinde and Henry Gekonde)