MPs, activists allege parliamentary report on sugar crisis doctored

Kenya: Controversy has arisen over the yet to be tabled parliamentary report on the crisis facing the sugar industry.

A number of MPs and NGOs have raised concerns over the report's final details, which they fear might have been altered to allow the culprits to get off scot-free.

The House Agriculture committee's interim report titled, "The Crisis Facing the Sugar Industry in Kenya" has unearthed sugar barons and rogue companies that might have colluded to fleece Mumias Sugar Company over the years.

The report seen by The Standard implicates senior Mumias managers in running the company down while a section of committee members are alleged to have been compromised.

The committee chaired by Mandera North MP Adan Mohamed Nooru blames the Kenya Sugar Board for granting Mumias a licence to import sugar even when there was enough in the country.

In its report, the 29-member team gives a blow by blow account of the gloomy state of affairs in the sugar sector.

Back claims

West Kenya Sugar Company, another player in the sector, is alleged to have acquired its operation licence fraudulently yet it has gone to court to block its neighbour, Butali Sugar Mills, from acquiring a licence.

At a press conference at the Mumias Cultural Centre yesterday, activist Okiya Omtatah said the report, expected to be tabled in Parliament next week, is not the "original report".

"On 19th September 2013, National Assembly Speaker Justin Muturi tabled on the floor of the House a petition by the Western Development Initiative Association on the imminent collapse of the sugar industry in Western Kenya," said Mr Omtatah who was flanked by other Kenyans for Justice and Development Trust members.

He said the MPs did a good job only for the final report to omit the names of those behind Mumias' collapse, including the omission of firms that did business with the company that he said should be investigated.

"We have learned that those the report accuses of being responsible for the destruction of the sugar industry have compromised the departmental committee on Agriculture." said Omtatah. "Some Sh400 million changed hands and as a result, the report has been changed and the culprits are off the hook."

Omtatah claimed his organisation had evidence to back his claims, waving photocopies of what he said were bank slips indicating how sugar barons paid some of the MPs in a move to ensure the actual report was not tabled in Parliament.

Lugari MP Ayub Savula, a committee member, raised concerns over the allegations, saying investigations should be carried out over the said Sh400 million changing hands.

"I have seen a photocopy of a bank slip but all I ask is that the matter is investigated so we can know what really happened," Mr Savula said.

His Mumias East counterpart, Ben Washiali, accused a former Mumias managing director of "looting the company's operational account".

"The operational account was Sh19 billion some 10 years ago, but today it is zero," Mr Washiali said last week.