According to National Treasury records, Kimwarer and Arrow dams received Ksh16.2 billion from an Italian bank when the investigations were ongoing.
The Treasury’s public debt registry indicates that an Italian bank wired the billions in the year starting July 2019. This happened just days after the then Treasury Cabinet Secretary, Henry Rotich, was apprehended on suspicion of financial mismanagement in the contract to construct the tow dams.
The two dams are said to have received the Ksh16.2 billion in two phases of Ksh11 billion and Ksh5.2 billion.Â
The project, which was meant to benefit the residents of the Kimwarer area was rocked with numerous graft allegations with the money meant to fund them failing to be accounted for.
The Director of Public Prosecution, Noordin Haji, dragged former CS Rotich at the center of the scandal alleging that he authorised the direct payment of insurance money to a firm in Italy contrary to the law, which requires that all payments are processed through the consolidated account in Kenya.
He was further accused of hiding behind government procurement to single source for a private firm that received Ksh11 billion.
The government reckoned that the push to bypass wiring the cash to consolidate funds was engineered to facilitate kickbacks.
These new details emerge just days after claims of a court file for the same case was reported missing.
The case was stalled on Monday, September 20, after it emerged that the file with documents challenging the prosecution of Italian firm CMC Di Ravenna boss could not be tracked.
Judge Anthony Mrima requested the parties involved to give the court more time to find the file which was crucial for the ongoing trial.
The Italian companies that were dragged into the Ksh63 billion Arror and Kimwarer dams scandals had earlier sued Kenya in the International Court of Arbitration.Â
They argued that the fallout between President Uhuru Kenyatta and his Deputy William Ruto contributed to the stalling of the multi-billion project.
Source: KENYAGIST.COM
