Kenya's finance minister denies graft charges

By Magdalene Mukami

NAIROBI, Kenya (AA) - Kenya’s finance minister who was arrested on Monday over multi-million dollar corruption scandals pleaded not guilty to 24 graft charges before Chief Magistrate Douglas Ogoti on Tuesday.

Henry Rotich and 10 others are charged with abuse of office, economic crimes, receiving bribes and conspiracy to defraud the government among other graft-related charges.

The case stems from two dam contracts, the “Arror and Kimwarer” dam projects, whereby many legal procedures were ignored by the government officials to ensure that certain companies were awarded the construction contracts.

Noordin Haji, the Director of Public Prosecutions, said that the two dams Kimwarer Dam and Arror Dam would both cost approximately 46 billion Kenya shillings but the National Treasury negotiated a commercial facility illegally increasing the amount to approximately 63 billion Kenya shillings.

The Directorate of Criminal Investigations said that it will issue international arrest warrants for those who are not in Kenya including three Italians from CMC Di Ravena, the company which illegally acquired contracts to construct the dams, through corruption.

Rotich denied the charges and was released on 50 million Kenya shillings cash bail which is roughly $500,000 and a surety of 15 million Kenya shillings. The state officers were further ordered by the Kenyan court to stay away from their offices.

Mega corruption scandals have dominated Kenya’s headlines in recent months. This has forced President Uhuru Kenyatta to declare a zero-tolerance war on the vice. This year, the East African nation was ranked 144th out of 180 by Transparency International's Corruption Perception Index.