brad brace contemporary culture scrapbook

The government has announced that some civil servants would be sacked over the Armenian brothers’ saga, even as Catholic Archbishop Ndingi Mwana ‘a Nzeki called for the sacking of all those involved.

The Immigration and Registration of Persons assistant minister, Ananiah Mwaboza, said the first to go would be officials who issued the two brothers with Kenyan passports.

“Even the police officers who issued Artur Magaryan with a letter showing he is a deputy commissioner of police should go,” Mwaboza said at a press conference in Mombasa.

He said issuing a foreigner with a document he can use to even stop a pilot from taking off from Kenyan Airports was a serious matter. He said the civil servants who issued such documents were dangerous.

“This is risking the lives of Kenyans and visitors because even terrorists can have access to documents which they can use to bring into the airport dangerous items,” said Mwaboza.

He took issue with the Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA) officials who took part in the verification of a controversial container, which was imported by the Armenian brothers. The minister said the verification of the container at the port was not done properly.

He said the basement of the container, which was covered by an iron sheet, should have been drilled to check if there were drugs underneath. Mwaboza demanded the removal of Custom officers who issued a report that the container had been verified, saying the officials could no longer be trusted.

Commission of Inquiry

Ndingi said those implicated in the activities of the alleged Armenian brothers, Artur Margaryan and Artur Sargasyan, should be sacked immediately. He wondered how the two foreigners found their way into the country and engaged in various activities without the knowledge or connivance of Government officials.

Without mentioning names, Ndingi said he believed individuals who abetted the actions of the Armenians were known and should be held responsible. The Archbishop was responding to questions by journalists at the Blessed Sacrament Catholic Church at Buru Buru, Nairobi, after presiding over Mass.

He asked: “How did they come to Kenya? If those who brought them here are known, and I suspect they are known, they should be sacked.”

The two foreigners were deported last weekend after they caused a security breach at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) by drawing guns on Customs officials. Last week, President Kibaki appointed a Commission of Inquiry to investigate the events leading to their deportation.

Kibaki also suspended Criminal Investigations Department (CID) director Joseph Kamau and 10 other Government officials, including police officers attached to JKIA. But leaders accused the President of going after small fry, leaving the big fish to go scot-free.

Politicians and civil society officials have demanded the sacking of Internal Security minister John Michuki and his Immigration counterpart, Gideon Konchellah. The ministers had defended the two Armenians as legitimate investors.

Containers left port

Meanwhile, conflicting instructions have stopped police from towing away the vehicles left by the Artur brothers at their Runda residence in Nairobi. The vehicles had fake registration numbers and their chassis numbers had been tampered with.

Police officers told The Standard that they had made several unsuccessful attempts to remove the vehicles, which remained under guard, as their seniors have been issuing conflicting instructions. Police sources also said there could be up to Sh40 million in foreign currency left in the house by the deported brothers.

The money was allegedly locked in a safe in one of the five bedrooms. It has emerged that 29 other containers suspected to have been imported by the two brothers had left Mombasa port.

Senior Deputy Commissioner of Customs, Alfonse Ntongaiti, said KRA discovered too late that the containers had been cleared without the brothers paying duty. He said KRA had seized three more containers reportedly imported by the brothers. Ntongaiti said one container would be opened on Monday to ascertain if it had drugs. On Friday, electronic goods were found in a container said to have been imported by the Armenians.

And a cleaner at the Immigration Department in Nyayo House, Nairobi, has been arrested over the issuance of fake passports to the Artur brothers. Police said that for a Sh500 bribe, she smuggled out blank passport materials, which were later handed over to the Armenians. The suspect allegedly gained entry to the strongroom on second floor at Nyayo House, while on duty and allegedly stole the passport numbers A1031194, A1031195 and A1031196 on May 2. Officials are said to have discovered the theft three days later.

An Immigration officer has also been suspended over the issuance of the fake passports, which were seized by police during a raid on the Arturs’ Runda residence.

Thousands of acres of Mau Forest are now in private hands following a shady deal involving top Government officials and well connected individuals.

Investigations reveal that Government surveyors and other officials conspired to acquire forestland by illegally extending the boundaries of five group ranches neighbouring Mau forest.

This eventually led to loss of 14,103 hectares of forestland, which the rogue officers sold and issued the beneficiaries with fake title deeds without involving relevant Government departments.

A report compiled after the investigation says the officials subsequently prepared new forest maps to conceal their actions. However, the Government has dismissed the fake maps and is now drawing new ones.

The report, Maasai Mau Status Report, is authored by the Kenya Wildlife Service, the United Nations Environment Programme, the Ewaso Ngiro South Development Authority and the Kenya Forests Working Group.

Illegal settlement

It recommends the prosecution of Government officials – including surveyors, land registrars and district commissioners – who it says flouted the law to illegally subdivide the forest and give it out to individuals.

The Director of Survey, Joseph Mathenge, confirmed that eight officials, including three former land registrars, were under investigations and are likely to be charged.

Mathenge confirmed that the report’s findings tally with investigations by the Survey of Kenya. He said the Criminal Investigations Department was on the trail of some of the officials, who have now gone underground.

The officials’ actions led to invasion of Mau Forest by over 10,000 people, who the Government evicted last year. The report covers Maasai Mau, which straddles Narok District and is part of the Mau Forest Complex, one of Kenya’s biggest but fast disappearing forests.

The illegal settlement opened the forest to human activity and seriously affected the source of water to millions of people living around the forest.

NAIROBI, Kenya — Kenyans paid more bribes in 2005 compared with 2004, especially when dealing with law enforcement officers and buying basic services like health care, according to a report released by an anti-graft group on Monday.

The study, the Kenya Bribery Index, compiled by the Kenyan chapter of graft watchdog Transparency International, said Kenyans encountered bribery in 47 percent of their interactions with officials in 2005, compared with 34 percent in 2004.

“To us it seems that Kenyans have accepted bribery as a way of life. We find that Kenyans live with bribery everyday, every minute,” Evelyn Mungai, chairperson of Transparency International Kenya, said at the launch of the index.

The report said the majority of bribes were paid to the police, followed by state-owned companies and local authorities.

“I’m not proud to come here year in year out to tell you that our vital public institutions are rotten,” said Mwalimu Mati, Transparency International Kenya’s executive director.

“What we are calling petty bribery is not as small a problem as we might imagine. Our country is bleeding from corruption.”

The study showed that Kenya’s fight against graft was losing steam. In 2003 Kenyans encountered bribery in just over 40 percent of their dealings with officials.

“Clearly the enthusiasm that was there, that proactive efforts by wananchi (citizens) dissipated at some point,” David Ndii, a research adviser at TI-Kenya said.

“Also the government’s zero tolerance platform has been dealt very serious credibility blows.”

President Mwai Kibaki’s government came to power in late 2002 with a pledge to fight graft, but Kenyans are becoming increasingly doubtful of its ability to win, given its failure to prosecute senior officials accused of involvement in dubious procurement contracts.

Kibaki’s government is grappling with graft scandals linked to a procurement racket, dubbed Anglo Leasing, in which state contracts worth some $200 million went to a phantom company.

The scandal, along with another called Goldenberg, in which $1 billion was looted from state coffers through fictitious diamond and gold exports in the early 1990s, forced three ministers to resign.

Published: 14 May 2006

MOMBASA: A tuna fish caught in the Indian Ocean has excited Kenyan Muslims who are flocking here by the hundreds to see a Quranic verse apparently embedded in its scales.

Dubbed the “wonder fish” by locals in this port city, the 2.5kg tuna has attracted so much attention it has been placed in the custody of the National Fisheries Department for safekeeping.

The otherwise ordinary fish caught the attention of fishmonger Omar Mohammed Awadh who pulled it out of a catch when he noticed what seemed to be Arabic writing among the scales near its tail.

Arabic scholars determined the writing was a verse meaning “God is the greatest of all providers”, said Hassan Mohamed Hassan, with the National Museums of Kenya.

“This has been confirmed as a verse from the Quran,” said Sheikh Mombasa Dor, the secretary-general of the Council of Imams and Preachers.