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Man on trial: Senators to hear graft charges against impeached governor Mutai
Kericho Governor Erick Mutai is fighting to save his political career three years after a landslide victory in the 2022 General Election.
Senators will on Wednesday, August 20, decide the conduct for the impeachment trial of besieged Kericho Governor Erick Mutai, even as bribery claims loom large over Parliament.
The development comes after Senate Speaker Amason Kingi convened a special sitting on Wednesday to hear charges against the first-term governor.
The senators will, during the session, resolve whether to investigate charges leveled against the county boss, either through the plenary or an 11-member special committee.
“I have today, through a gazette notice, invited Senators for a special sitting on Wednesday, August 20, 2025, to hear the charges against Honourable Eric Kipkoech Mutai, Governor of Kericho County,” reads the gazette notice.
The Senate during the impeachment trial of Kericho County Governor Erick Mutai on October 14, 2024.
The announcement follows a formal communication from Kericho County Assembly Speaker Patrick Mutai, which was received by Mr Kingi’s office on Monday.
This is after 33 out of 47 MCAs of the county assembly voted to impeach the former university lecturer on August 15, 2025. The impeachment motion was initiated by Sigowet Ward MCA Kiprotich Rogony.
Governor Mutai, facing a second impeachment within a year, has been accused of several charges of abuse of office, skewed, irregular, and illegal appointments, and sacking of senior officers, nepotism in the appointment.
The county chief allegedly presided over the pilferage of public resources, double payments to contractors, and flouted the Public Finance Management Act, the Constitution and the County Governments Act.
After reading the charges facing the governor, Senate Majority Leader Aaron Cheruiyot is expected to move a motion for the establishment of the special committee, a motion, if supported by a majority of the senators, will see the charges investigated through the committee route.
Kericho County Governor Erick Mutai.
But should the special committee route lack support from the senators, then the governor will have to face the plenary as he fights for political survival.
On October 2, 2024, a total of 31 MCAs voted to impeach Dr Mutai, but 12 days later, the Senate overturned the assembly’s resolution, giving the county chief a political lifeline.
The governor survived the imminent removal from office on a technicality even before the impeachment trial could begin.
This is after a majority of senators voted to terminate the impeachment trial on the basis of Kericho County Assembly having failed to meet the two-thirds threshold needed to impeach a governor by a single MCA.
This time, the assembly ensured the threshold was met following a tense day-long session in which the governor unsuccessfully failed to convince the MCAs otherwise.
However, the governor and his allies have mounted a spirited fightback, with 18 MCAs signing a petition challenging the electronic voting system deployed by Speaker Mutai, with claims it was pre-programmed to skew the results.
The MCAs have also written to the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) requesting investigations into the alleged “use of unauthorised internet-based digital voting system during assembly proceedings…”
Among the particulars facing the governor are inflation of prices of goods and services purchased by the county government of Kericho by up to 1,000 percent.
Dr Mutai is accused of presiding over an administration that witnessed the pilferage of taxpayers' money, with payment of Sh85.7 million to 46 companies for services and goods not supplied and work not done.
Engineer Fred Kirui, the Deputy Governor who was the whistleblower in the alleged scam, had written to the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC), the Directorate of Criminal Investigations, the Senate, and the Auditor General, demanding action against those allegedly involved.
At the crux of the claims is the alleged purchase of tissue papers at a cost of Sh2,700 each as compared with the average market prices of Sh25.
The county government also purchased a hand towel at Sh3,600 as compared with the average market prices of Sh300.
Kericho Governor Erick Mutai before the Senate over his impeachment by MCAs.
The governor has, however, denied the claims as he seeks to salvage his career in the impeachment, stating that the issue had been taken out of context.
Mr Katwa Kigen, the governor’s lead lawyer, told the Assembly during the impeachment proceedings at the assembly on Friday last week that the prices quoted were not for single items as had been claimed.
“We wish to clarify that the Sh2,700 for tissue papers supplied was not for single items but 40 bales supplied of 40 pieces each,” Mr Kigen told the house in response to the claims made.
In effect, going by the amount stated, the devolved government unit purchased each tissue for Sh67.50, translating to Sh108,000 for the 106,000 pieces delivered.
The hand towels supplied, according to the governor, were not at Sh3,600 each as stated in the report, which has been used in the impeachment proceedings facing him.
“The quoted price of Sh3,600 is for five dozen hand towels supplied and not per unit as was claimed,” Mr Kigen stated on the floor of the house while submitting responses in the impeachment motion on behalf of Dr Mutai.
Mr Rogony claimed the governor allegedly presided over a skewed and unfair distribution of donor-funded projects against the 30 civic wards in favour of only six in total disregard of the law and the Constitution of Kenya.
The Governor has said that the embezzlement of funds is not a political but a criminal matter and that the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) and the DCI were seized of most of the issues and a finding had not been released.
