How under scrutiny, EACC boss shot himself in the foot

Kurzweil · 2016-09-01T10:22:07+00:00

When they met the Justice and Legal Affairs Committee on August 4, members of the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission received a tongue-lashing from MPs. Nevertheless the four commissioners gave their reasons for asking their chairman, Phillip Kinisu, to step aside pending the conclusion of investigations on his alleged conflict of interest. But Mr Kinisu had produced documents showing that he left Esaki Ltd, the company run by his wife, in 2008, way before he even contemplated becoming Kenya’s anti-graft czar. This was the cause of the tongue-lashing, with the commissioners being told they have no option but to work with Mr Kinisu as they had nothing on him. When the committee met the petitioner, Albert Mokono Ondieki, last Wednesday, some members of the team were not impressed with his demeanour. And Mr Ondieki did not help right that impression. During the meeting, he muttered, “I’m getting tired” when the MPs asked him the nature of his practice as an advocate vis-à-vis his position that he was presenting the petition as an individual. But Mr Ondieki had documents from the EACC showing that Mr Kinisu did not register his conflict of interest in the required documents when he took up the job. More damning was a letter from the Registrar of Companies stating that Mr Kinisu has been an active shareholder and director of the company between January 2000 and April 19, 2016. The committee met Mr Kinisu the following day and he confirmed, to the MPs’ shock, that he remains a signatory to the bank account of Esaki Ltd, showing that he has a high level of control over its dealings. This did not go down well with MPs, who accused him of lying and misleading the committee. In its report, the committee would later conclude that it does not matter whether he left the company or not. “The law widens conflict of interest to include a spouse or relative. Therefore even if Mr Kinisu was never a shareholder or a director of Esaki Limited, he would be considered to have a personal interest in the company by virtue of the directorship, management and shareholding of his wife and his daughter,” the committee said in its report. He had also rubbed the commission’s secretariat the wrong way by writing to the Central Bank governor on the investigations on the Eurobond issue without involving them. The secretariat was reported to have been unhappy and only got to discover the chairman’s attempt to get information from Central Bank when Dr Patrick Njoroge, the governor, copied the secretary, Halakhe Waqo, in his reply. Central Bank boss told him that the necessary documents had been given to investigators and that future communications on the subject should be made through the commission’s secretary and chief executive Halakhe Waqo.

Thread starter Kurzweil
Start date Sep 1, 2016

Kurzweil

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How under scrutiny, EACC boss shot himself in the foot

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