I was offered cash and told it was from Ruto, says witness in lawyer Gicheru's ICC case

James Stewart, ICC Deputy Prosecutor. [Courtesy]

A fourth witness placed Deputy President William Ruto at the centre of bribery machinery that persuaded witnesses to drop their testimony against him and radio journalist Joshua Arap Sang.

Witness P-0274 yesterday took a cue from the other witnesses who appeared in court before him and claimed he met lawyer Paul Gicheru in his office where he was promised Sh500,000 to withdraw as a witness and introduce other witnesses to the lawyer.

P-0274 was a 2007-2008 post-election violence chaos victim. He narrated that he was attacked for supporting then-President Mwai Kibaki who vied on a Party of National Unity (PNU) ticket.

The court heard that he was a potential witness against Ruto. According to P-0274, the bribery money was coming from ‘mkubwa’ denoting a high-ranking person. Pressed who the mkubwa was, they stated that it was Ruto.

On the last day of the two weeks trial, the witness narrated that DP wanted no stone unturned.

“Did Gicheru tell why this was being offered, what was the purpose?” asked the prosecutor.

The witness replied: “It was for the purpose of hiding witnesses so they do not participate in the case against the then accused.”

“Gicheru told you this is how ‘we’ do it. Do you know who ‘we’ are?” the prosecutor continued.

“He said he was referring someone he called mkubwa which means a boss who I understand was William Ruto,” the witness stated. 

“Did Gicheru tell you anything else?” P-0274 was asked. He replied: “He (Gicheru) told me the boss wants no stone unturned in these issues, that why wanted me to assist in finding other witnesses.”

ICC Deputy Prosecutor James Stewart in his trial brief had stated that P-0274 had been threatened several times.

Deputy President William Ruto at the ICC, Netherlands, 2016. [Courtesy]

It is alleged that the witness was corruptly influenced between April 2012 and thereafter he was pursued until 2014.

Trial Chamber III judge Maria Samba heard that after he was promised Sh500,000, the witness was required to get more witnesses out of the case. He however got Sh10,000 for fare.

According to the witness, he was allegedly handed an affidavit stating that the ICC attempted to coach him to give evidence against Ruto.

After witness tampering suspects were named in 2011, P-0274 claimed he received a letter threatening him to keep his mouth shut.

He claimed that things went quiet until after the 2013 elections when Ruto was elected as Deputy President. According to the witness, he started receiving threats again.

He stated that P-0341 told him that Gicheru had paid him (P-0341) Sh500,000 and promised to pay a further equal amount for not providing information against DP to the ICC, and to be left in peace.

According to the witness, he was taken to Gicheru towards the end of 2013 by P-0341. The latter had instructions to hunt for P-0274. 

It emerged that P-0274 had been asked to bring P-0356, and P-0704 in exchange for Sh5 million.