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Kibaki: MPs will face the law
21/09/2005 22:13 - (SA)
Nairobi - The Kenyan government has announced that 65 members of parliament and cabinet ministers face prosecution for failing to declare their wealth as required by law.
Wealth declaration is a method President Mwai Kibaki's government, which has been dogged by widespread corruptions in its two and a half years in office, is using to promote transparency and accountability.
"There is nothing to stop the Director of Public Prosecution from taking these officials to court and charging them in accordance with the law," said Justice and Constitutional Affairs Minister Kiraitu Murungi.
In 2003, the government built wealth declaration requirements into the Public Officer Ethics Act.
The Act demands all public officials, from the president to government messengers, declare their income, assets and liabilities including those of their spouses and dependent children.
But human rights activists and anti-graft campaigners say the Act is insufficient since it provides for the information to be kept confidential after declaration.
"How can the public hold their leaders accountable when information on their wealth is kept secret?" asks Jeff Birundi, coordinator of the Name and Shame Corruption Networks Campaign.
"If the Act makes it criminal to reveal this kind of information, of what use is it in the first place."
Several African countries have laws that require public servants to disclose their assets, as well as publicise the information in the official gazettes.
Others offer the information to members of the public upon request either free of charge or at a minimal fee.
Last year, the government made it more difficult for the media to access information it deemed classified.
This came after the Anglo-Leasing scandal involvings the irregular allocation of tenders and payments towards the making, among other things, of terrorist-proof passports.
The payments, totaling $88.7m, were made to Anglo-Leasing, a foreign company whose owners the government claims remain unknown.
Even though the ministers for finance and transport were implicated, they have distanced themselves from the scam, which has put the government at loggerheads with western donors.
To the dismay of anti-graft groups, the government chose to sack four permanent secretaries from the ministries that handled the payments and asked the Kenya Anti-Corruption Commission to investigate.
Although the commission lacks prosecutorial powers, the government insists those found guilty would be prosecuted.
The government maintains that it has not reneged on its commitment to fight graft, citing its recent move to hire a British company to trace some $945m dollars stashed in foreign bank accounts by looters over the years.
The company, Kroll and Associates presented its report to the government last month.
Kibaki's administration has yet to disclose the contents of the report.
"We are still studying it before developing a plan of action," said Dorothy Angote, a senior official in the ministry of Justice and Constitutional Affairs.
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