Family that was paid nearly half a billion shillings in maize scandal speaks out

Victoria Rotich shows one of her maize planters.She plants over 1000 acres of maize. [photo/Fred Kibor, Standard]

The Eldoret “farmer by default” who scooped nearly half a billion shillings in the National Cereals and Produce Board (NCPB) payments believes she was cut out for athletics.

Victoria Rotich, 62, betrays the image of a disappointed village millionaire when we caught up with her on her expansive Kabiyet farm in Moiben. She is disappointed that fruits of her labour and the sweat of her brow have been turned into a scandal.

The mother of four hit the headlines after her three children were named in the NCPB maize scandal: Celestine Chepchirchir, Caroline Chepchumba and Rodney Kimutai were paid Sh333 million, Sh96 million and Sh2.2 million, respectively, according to the audit report which also indicated their status as traders and not farmers.

The monies aside, she is now wishing that she had stuck to her athletics dream after completing CPE studies decades ago. At her prime, she was a middle distance runner who represented Chebororwa Primary School up to the national level.

“I was brought up in a conservative family and my late father preferred to educate boys leaving me and my sisters at home for marriage. At school I was also an astute singer and I even entertained the country’s founding father Mzee Jomo Kenyatta,” she recalls.

Had she gotten a sponsor she believes that she would have prospered in athletics. By the time she met her husband who incidentally was also a farmer, Mrs Rotich had already set out to be a business woman.

“My whole life is dedicated to my farm. Many a time I have spent the entire night with the workers harvesting our maize. I do not know whether a cartel can spend the night in the cold but a hardworking farmer can,” she avers.

She says she has learnt many lessons in the three decades of farming.

Rotich discloses that she has been delivering thousands of bags of maize to NCPB without raising eyebrows.

When we caught up with her, she was putting urea on her 500 acres of farm to balance the soil PH before planting wheat.

“Farming has become expensive lately, the soils have become very acidic, if you are keen to get more produce, you must put more alkaline to the soil, this together with more bags of fertiliser is draining us,” say Rotich.

Contrary to perception that she lives large, the 62-year-old drives a jalopy, doesn’t wear makeup and passes off as an ordinary village woman.

At the heart her trouble occasioned by the recent audit, are the 1500 farmers who she supports and have continuously delivered cereals to the National Cereals and Produce Board under her name.

“Due to the delay in payment at the NCPB, they prefer to do it under my name. I therefore pay them in cash and wait for the delayed cheques, i get a small margin of profit by waiting,” she said.

She claims that due to the vagaries of prices and lack of storage facilities, the farmers have continuously done that for the last over ten years.

On the recent controversy she says that 2017 has been a unique year for her. She had planned to quit farming and introduce her children to the trade.

“I therefore took the produce from our over 2100 acres under maize and that from the 1,500 farmers who have been delivering the maize through my account,” she says.

This were all recorded at NCPB under three children. “I have previously been paid millions of my sweat, i have not stolen a single shilling, instead I support several farmers,” she said.

Rotich has been buying maize from the late former Cabinet minister Nicholas Biwott’s, Krugger farms.

She says the reputation of her trade allowed her to obtain loans of Sh110 million from the Agricultural Finance Corporation (AFC) and Sh30 million from Oriental Bank, which she used to purchase maize from other farmers.

“Since the NCPB has delayed my payments I have defaulted servicing the loan as well as paying farmers who I owe Sh80 million,” she reveals.

Since 1982, she has been conducting the business with her husband who died in 2000. Following the demise, she took over the business empire which according to her has expanded tremendously.

At her home locals are streaming in and within an hour, over 100 farmers demand her attention with a sole purpose to inquire when they will receive their pay.

Her farm sits on a 700-acre plot she acquired while she leases other plots spanning 1,000 acres.

She grows maize, wheat, exotic butternuts and keeps dairy cattle as well as sheep. She owns four huge and modern state of the art tractors complete with the latest implements as well as trucks to transport the produce. 

Farmers from as far as Nandi, Trans Nzoia, Elgeyo Marakwet and Uasin Gishu frequently visit her home for financial assistance and in exchange of their maize produce, which according to her basically explains how she delivered thousands of bags of maize to NCPB.

“I thrived over the years from bailing out distressed farmers who have now become part of me. The government instead of rewarding me for sustaining the livelihoods of small holder’s farmers, I get an insulted that I am part of a cartel? It is disheartening,” she states.

Kenya Farmers Association director Kipkorir Menjo also said the traders are well-known farmers listed by the association.

“The government needs to really look out for the cartels who imported maize from outside the country and filled up the NCPB stores. The list of traders they have given out does not contain cartels,” Menjo said.