Issack Hassan to be quizzed on ‘Chicken’ scandal on Thursday

What you need to know:

  • Election boss Hassan and others summoned for questioning by EACC over tenders.
  • Anti-corruption commission says its detectives will rely heavily on evidence filed by UK’s Serious Fraud Office.

Elections boss Issack Hassan and Energy Secretary Davis Chirchir are among five people who have been summoned for questioning over the “chicken” scandal that led to the jailing of two people in the United Kingdom last Thursday.

Mr Hassan, the chairman of the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC), is on Thursday expected at Integrity Centre in Nairobi, where the anti-corruption team will question him over the role that he and other officials of the Interim Independent Electoral Commission (IIEC) played in the scandal involving payments of bribes, code-named “chicken” in emails, estimated at Sh50 million between October 1, 2008 and December 31, 2010.

Mr Chirchir, who worked as a commissioner at the now-defunct IIEC before being appointed to the Cabinet, will be questioned on Friday.

Also summoned for interrogation is former IEBC Chief Executive James Oswago and former exams chief Paul Wasanga, who are expected to appear before the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) on Tuesday.

SEEKING INFORMATION

Mr Wasanga is being investigated over allegations that he received money to award a tender to Smith & Ouzman for the printing of examination certificates.

The Daily Nation also learnt that anti-corruption detectives spent the whole of Wednesday sifting through documents at the electoral commission’s offices at Anniversary Towers, seeking information related to the tenders.

On Thursday, a UK court jailed two company directors after finding them guilty of paying bribes to election and examination officials to induce them to award printing contracts to their company, Smith & Ouzman.

The company and its directors were, in January found guilty of paying out millions of shillings through its agent, identified as Trevy James Oyombra. The directors were sentenced last week.

EACC officials said Mr Oyombra will be questioned next week.

“By the end of next week, all those who have been mentioned in this scandal will have recorded their statements and files forwarded to the DPP, depending on the outcome of those interrogations,” said EACC spokesman Yassin Amaro.

“The UK has done their part. The giver has been prosecuted. Now we are after the receiver who, in this case, is said to be Kenyan.”

I AM READY

Four of those to be questioned confirmed that they had been summoned and would appear before investigators as directed. However, Mr Oswago denied receiving the summons.

“If they want me to appear before them, I am ready to go there even now but they have not contacted me,” he said.

Four detectives have been assigned to record statements from the five. They are expected to rely heavily on the evidence file obtained from the UK’s Serious Fraud Office and which was used to convict and jail the two Smith & Ouzman directors.

Last week, Nicholas Charles Smith, 43, was jailed for three years by the Southwark Crown Court for bribing IIEC officials to secure contracts to print ballot papers.

His father, Christopher John Smith, 71, was sentenced to an 18-month suspended term for his role in the scandal.

The elder Smith was the company’s chairman, while Nicholas was the sales and marketing director at the time of the scandal. IIEC is the predecessor of the current electoral commission.

During the hearing of the case in a London court, the prosecution said the bribes were wired to Mr Oyombra’s bank account and that it was he who would withdraw the money and give it to the officials.

Mr Oyombra would also hold meetings with the officials of both institutions to plan how tenders would be skewed in favour of Smith & Ouzman and the amount of bribes to be given out in return for the “favours”.

Smith & Ouzman would also foot at least some of the travel and accommodation costs of top IIEC and Knec officials whenever they travelled to London, the prosecution said.

They would also give the officials some “chicken” so that they could shop for their families.

All the Kenyans named in the scandal have denied receiving bribes to influence the awarding of tenders.

Once it completes its investigations, the EACC will hand over the file to the office of the Director of Public Prosecutions who will then decide whether to prosecute the officials implicated in the scandal.

“For us, this is not a political issue but rather, a corruption-related issue and it is our mandate to investigate it,” said Mr Amaro.