Are the woes at anti-graft commission a sign of corruption fighting back?

What you need to know:

  • The saga brings to mind eerie memories of the disbandment of the Kenya Anti-Corruption Authority (Kaca). Then, as now, trouble for the authority started when it took a powerful figure to court. In what seemed to be well-choreographed processes, Kaca was swiftly disbanded.
  • Some serious questions come to mind: Are there powerful forces bent on using EACC’s current tribulations to annihilate it?
  • Those alleged to be gatekeeping for corruption interests should be investigated and punished and the commission left alone to continue its work.

The past week has been dramatic at the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission. It started off with the suspension of the deputy CEO by the commission, quickly revoked by the CEO the following day.

Then accusations started flying, first against the chairman and other commissioners, and later against the CEO and his deputy. The Office of the President weighed in to inform the public that a petition signed by two commissioners against the chairman had been received in September 2014. The two commissioners disowned the petition, stating that they were misled.

After a week of back-and-forth, the commission and the CEO announced that they had resolved the sticking issues that had led to the public spat. They said they would work together and that the deputy CEO’s suspension had been lifted. It later emerged that the deputy CEO had agreed to go on leave as investigations carried out.

It is now public knowledge that Parliament has received a petition seeking the investigation and possible removal of the chairman and vice-chair of the commission. It remains to be seen what action Parliament will take.

In all this drama, one thing is clear: serious allegations have been levelled against commissioners and senior officers of the commission. These allegations should be investigated fully and expeditiously, if the image of the commission is to be redeemed.

The saga brings to mind eerie memories of the disbandment of the Kenya Anti-Corruption Authority (Kaca). Then, as now, trouble for the authority started when it took a powerful figure to court. In what seemed to be well-choreographed processes, Kaca was swiftly disbanded.

This history informed the contentious inclusion of the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission under Chapter Six of the Constitution of Kenya 2010; to forestall future attempts to disband the commission should it grow teeth and be seen as a threat to corruption syndicates.

SERIOUS QUESTIONS

Some serious questions come to mind: Are there powerful forces bent on using EACC’s current tribulations to annihilate it? Are senior personalities at the commission beholden to political and corruption cartels? Could the commission’s recent investigations have touched a raw nerve among powerful circles?

The serious allegations levelled against officials at the commission should be thoroughly investigated by an independent entity and anyone found culpable dealt with in accordance with the law.

However, it is also important to consider the possibility that the allegations of impropriety could be an excuse to intimidate or even kill the commission — a classic case of burning the house to kill a rat.

Institutions act through individuals. Culpability is personalised. Wrongs are committed by individual officers. Those alleged to be gatekeeping for corruption interests should be investigated and punished and the commission left alone to continue its work.

Kenyans must be vigilant and demand accountability from all institutions, while at the same time being alert to any forces that may want to weaken or kill institutions of accountability. That is why the February 27 judgment of the High Court that the mandate of the Commission on Administrative Justice is only limited to advisory and unenforceable recommendations is alarming and should be appealed.

An independent audit of the work of the EACC should also be carried out. Kenyans need to understand why a commission that is mandated to fight corruption is unable to recover stolen assets and mete out punishment to the thieves of public wealth in a country where most public procurements are tainted by corruption.

The fight against corruption cannot succeed if there is impunity for those who steal public funds.
We must move beyond generalised condemnations of institutions and hold individual officers responsible for their misdeeds.

Accountability at individual, unit, or departmental level must build up to accountability at the institutional level. This will make it possible to strengthen public institutions and protect them from powerful forces that may want to destroy them.

The writer is the executive director of Transparency International Kenya