Court told firm that wired cash to Waititu was paid Sh461m

Former Kiambu Governor Ferdinand Waititu follows court proceedings at Milimani. [Collins Kweyu, Standard]

An investigator has disclosed how a company which allegedly wired millions of shillings to former Kiambu Governor Ferdinand Waititu as kickbacks was paid Sh461 million.

Alex Kinyanjui, a forensic investigator at Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) testified that his analysis of the Integrated Financial Management Information System (IFMIS) showed the money was paid to Testimony Enterprises Ltd by the County Government of Kiambu between 2017 and 2019.

“I discovered that Testimony Enterprises Ltd was one of the suppliers for the County Government of Kiambu and had 42 invoices for payments, some of which were approved while others were not approved by county officials,” said Kinyanjui.

Kinyanjui was testifying in the case where Waititu, his wife Susan Wangari and the directors of Testimony Enterprises Ltd Charles Chege and his wife Beth Wangeci are charged with conspiracy to defraud the county government through a Sh588 million contract for roads repair.

They are facing the charges alongside former County Chief Officer for Roads Luka Mwangi and five former county employees, Zacharia Mbugua, Joyce Ngina, Simon Kang’ethe, Anslem Wanjiku and Samuel Muigai.

Kinyanjui told Anti-Corruption Court Chief Magistrate Thomas Nzyoki that when EACC received information of the alleged theft of public funds from Kiambu County, they formed a team of investigators where he was tasked to collect information from the IFMIS system.

“I was given access to the IFMIS system after which I retrieved all the information regarding payments to Testimony Enterprises from the county government,” said Kinyanjui.

The investigator said he first retrieved invoices of payments of Sh240 million from Kiambu County to Testimony Enterprises and additional Sh221 million which was signed as release payments to the company for a contract for upgrading roads in the county.

He confirmed that the company was one of the registered suppliers for the county government and that the payments it received were created, updated and approved by officials from Kiambu County.

Delta Hotel along University Way in Nairobi. [Phillip Orwa, Standard]

Waititu and the former county officials are accused of irregularly awarding the contract to Testimony Enterprises Ltd in which the prosecution alleges that the plot to defraud the county was hatched by Chege.

According to the charge sheet, the scandal started in February 26 2018 when Chege and his wife presented false degree certificates to the Kiambu County tender committee to prove that their company was capable of undertaking the roads construction work. In February 2018, they allegedly submitted the bid to Kiambu County’s tender committee which approved it without subjecting it to scrutiny.

The prosecution claimed that in March 2018, the county’s minister for Roads and Transport used his office to approve and confer a benefit of Sh588,198,328 to Testimony Enterprises by awarding the contract to upgrade the roads when the company had no such capacity.

The charges stated that between May 2018 and October 2018, the company fraudulently received Sh147.2 million from the Kiambu County Government and channelled a portion of the proceeds to Waititu and his wife through their companies Saika Two Estates Ltd and Benvenue Delta Hotel.

The prosecution’s case is that Waititu and his wife received part of the money as kickbacks while knowing that they were proceeds of crime and used Sh6 million from the proceeds to purchase Delta Hotel to disguise the source of funds. The hearing continues.