DP Ruto-linked Harun Aydin is not our customer, says Equity Bank

Equity Bank has denied Deputy President William Ruto’s claims that he helped to negotiate a Sh15 billion loan on behalf of an investor.

The lender’s senior management, while appearing yesterday before the National Assembly Committee on Finance and National Planning, said no such loan was advanced to a Ugandan company, Dei Pharmaceuticals Group, or deported Turkish national, Harun Aydin.

“I’m not aware of the phone call but given time, I can find out whom he called because we have many senior people, so I’m not sure who he might have called but it’s not me,” said Equity Bank Managing Director Gerald Warui.

Mr Warui, who was accompanied by the bank’s director of legal services Christine Browne and the chief risk and compliance officer Samuel Gitwekere.

While the bank officials admitted that Uganda’s Dei Group is their client, they denied ever advancing a Sh15 billion loan to it.

Ms Browne told MPs that even if they were to give the company a loan, their branch in Uganda can only advance maximum loans of up to Sh2.3 billion to a single client as per statutory limits, and not Sh15 billion.

'Ugandan investor'

DP Ruto, in an interview with a local radio station, had claimed that he had helped to negotiate for a loan of Sh15 billion on behalf of a Ugandan “investor.”

He took the interview a day after his trip to Uganda, which he termed as private and which he was to be accompanied by Mr Aydin, was controversially cancelled by the government.

“From the Equity point of view, we have no relationship with Mr Aydin at all. We have nothing to say about him because we don’t know him and we cannot be drawn to social media reports as Sh15 billion is a huge amount of money that cannot be given through a phone call,” added Ms Browne told the Homa Bay MP Gladys Wanga-led Committee.

The statements by Equity Bank officials now contradict DP Ruto's claims that he helped facilitate a loan through a phone call to help set up a vaccine manufacturing plant in Uganda.

Dp Ruto, accompanied by Mr Aydin and other close political and business associates, was stopped from boarding a flight to Entebbe from Nairobi’s Wilson airport. While the DP’s associates were later allowed to proceed to Uganda, the DP was reportedly asked by officials to provide proof from the Office of the President that he had permission to travel outside the country.

Mr Aydin was arrested on August 7 at the Wilson Airport on return from Entebbe by officers from the Anti-Terror Police Unit (ATPU).

Interior Cabinet Secretary, Fred Matiang’i, later told a parliamentary committee that the Turkish national was a terrorism financing and money laundering suspect hence his deportation.

Mr Warui told MPs that he sits on the Equity Bank board, the highest organ that approves loans of the Sh15 billion magnitude in question, but said that at no time was there a meeting to discuss the claimed advance.

Ms Wanga questioned why the bank officials failed to issue a communication to clarify its position on the matter when DP Ruto made the allegations on negotiating for a loan through a phone call.

According to Ms Wanga, the silence of the bank made people to conclude “that they were participating in money laundering activity.”

“The belief is that the Sh15 billion was being laundered so that the delegation to Uganda would find a way of bringing it back to Kenya,” Ms Wanga said.

“We leave here a very concerned lot that the Deputy President of the Republic of Kenya can lie to Kenyans about a call he made to Equity about the Sh15 billion loan yet there is nothing like that. We would expect a person of the DP’s stature to stick to the truth especially on such a sensitive matter,” Ms Wanga added.

According to the Committee chair, the claims by DP Ruto that he helped Mr Aydin secure Sh15 billion to set up a business in Uganda was a major setback to Kenya’s small business ventures that are struggling to make ends meet.

It emerged during the Committee session that Dei Pharmaceuticals, which is claimed to have received the Sh15 billion loan, owes Equity Bank Sh2.7 billion; but its accounts have been frozen by Ugandan officials on accusations of money laundering.

Kitui rural MP, David Mboni, said he has information that the company’s account has been frozen and there is a risk that Equity Bank might not get back its money.

Mr Gitwekere, however, told MPs that the bank will cooperate with its counterparts in Uganda about the claims and report back to the Committee.

He told MPs that as far as they are concerned, the loan advanced to the company was performing well and the vaccine manufacturing plant project is being closely monitored by the bank’s officials.

The Committee will meet Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA) officials in two weeks’ time as it continues with the investigations over the saga.