Graft Thrives In The Face Of 24 Agencies Set Up To Stamp It Out Daily Nation 07 February 2007 Page: 5
Numerous institutions set up to fight corruption have failed to stamp out the vice. The institutions are uncoordinated, without a guiding centre.
They start from the Office of the President, where there is the department of Governance and Ethics, which appears to have been phased out, to key autonomous commissions on which the taxpayer spends billions of shillings.
The Centre for Law and Research International (Clarion), in its report, Kenya: State of Corruption, identifies 24 institutions and government departments set up to fight corruption.
The multiplicity of such institutions, the report says, does not augur well for efforts to fight corruption.
It identifies the attorney general’s office as the most important because the holder enjoys security of tenure in addition to powers to prosecute and institute Bills in Parliament. The report indicts AG Amos Wako for failing to prosecute when he should have, and terminating cases that should be continued.
“Since this office has traditionally served political ends and it is a political appointment, it is ill-suited for combating corruption,” the report concludes about the AG.
Seriousness in prosecutions has been lacking, resulting in the many defeats the Government has suffered in courts, says the report. Since May 2003, the State can only pride itself on minimal convictions especially where top officials are concerned.
By February 2006, the AG had terminated seven cases involving grand corruption.
The Kenya Anti Corruption Commission (KACC), headed by Mr Justice Aaron Ringera, has shied away from prosecuting key personalities in society and Government, says the report. Its constant casualties are junior employees of the City Council, traffic policemen and obscure public officials. When it prosecutes a prominent person, it does so mostly out of pressure from politicians, the public and media.
The report doubts the efficacy of the Cabinet committee on corruption, because members of the Cabinet are corrupt and have been implicated in several scandals. The National Anti-Corruption Campaign Steering Committee, headed by the Rev Mutava Musyimi, is hardly heard in the war against graft.
It is meant to collect views from the public and use them to devise methods of advocacy against corruption, in addition to advising the public. The Public Accounts Committee, and Public Investments Committee have had success in investigating corruption cases but their recommendations are hardly implemented.