Waiguru walks alone as she fights latest woes

She was a high-flying technocrat who served in President Uhuru Kenyatta’s Cabinet, as the first Cabinet Secretary for Devolution, until she resigned in November 2015 following the first National Youth Service (NYS1) scandal that took place under her watch. In 2017 she returned as a politician and aspiring governor for Kirinyaga County against Narc-Kenya’s Martha Karua. She won.

Ms Waiguru has since been the face of the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI) tours in the larger Mount Kenya region, which is why Thursday’s early morning raid on her offices and homes of by the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) sleuths may signal a change in her political fortunes.

Friday, a high-ranking Jubilee official told the Saturday Nation that the party expects the governor to step aside if she is found culpable in the ongoing investigations, sentiments that could see her go the Waititu way. Former Kiambu Governor Ferdinand Waititu was summarily impeached by the Senate following graft charges.

Independent accounts from our sources revealed that the county chief may have been left to her own devices owing to a groundswell of issues, such as the incessant wrangling in her county, even as others pointed to the fact that she may have become too much baggage for her masters.

Leading BBI forces

The accusations levelled against her are not any grimmer if reports that some leading BBI forces have in the past intervened on behalf of a number of county bosses to have investigating agencies go slow on related cases against them.

When the NYS scandal that cost the taxpayer Sh791 million broke out, all of the government machinery came to her aide and no amount of pressure from then opposition led by ODM leader Raila Odinga could make the President sack her.

But today, Mr Kenyatta is particularly concerned about a long held narrative that there is a cabal of sacred cows in his government – the untouchables who steal from public coffers with reckless abandon, well aware that there will be no consequences.

“Let the agencies do their work. What has tainted the boss’ (Mr Kenyatta) reputation is the perception that some of the suspects are too big to fall. It is high time those in position of leadership were held to account for how they have expended public resources. If found guilty, we expect the law to take its full course,” the official who is close to the President said.

After coming to her aide during the impeachment motion in the Senate, ODM leadership has also taken a back seat during her latest tribulations, as they fear the public backlash of ‘defending graft’.

An ODM MP, who holds a senior parliamentary position, also says the backing she was accorded in the Senate was in reciprocation of her unwavering support for the BBI rallies, but they would rather EACC is left to do its work on this.

The EACC started probing Ms Waiguru on July 15, for faking trips to collect hefty travel allowances, along with some county staffers suspected to have forged documents to make it look like the trips had actually been taken.

Detectives suspect the governor’s chief of staff Sellah Bogonko, and chief finance officer Patrick Ndathi, helped forge the papers to save their boss’ skin.

On Thursday, teams from the EACC also raided homes and offices occupied by Ms Bogonko and Mr Ndathi from which they carted away computers and mobile devices believed to contain evidence.

Ms Bogonko is one of Ms Waiguru’s closest allies. Ms Waiguru gazetted Ms Bogonko’s appointment to the Youth Enterprise Development Fund in 2015, where the latter served for one year before the entire Board of Directors was sent home following a graft scandal.

Foreign trips

EACC took up the investigations after the Kirinyaga County Assembly lodged a formal complaint, arguing that Ms Waiguru had refused to furnish evidence of foreign trips that led to the payment of over Sh23 million in travel allowances.

In their complaint to the EACC, Kirinyaga MCAs insisted that evidence of Ms Waiguru’s alleged misdeeds can be found in the county’s cash books where the disputed payments were logged in. “They (Ms Waiguru, Ms Bogonko and Mr Ndathi) did not draw the payments from the Integrated Financial Management Information System (IFMIS).

They drew the payments from the cash book. When we asked Mr Ndathi to reveal the cash book, he refused. The EACC should just ask for the cash book,” Kirinyaga County Assembly lawyer Ndegwa Njiru said in a phone interview.

As things stand, Ms Waiguru and her suspected cohorts are staring at charges of embezzlement of public funds, forgery and abuse of office at the Anti-Corruption Court.

“Preliminary investigations have revealed that Sh23 million or thereabouts (was) misappropriated and/or spent in respect of non-existent trips. …Investigations further revealed a scheme hatched by the imprest recipients and some officials of the County government of Kirinyaga aimed at defeating the course of justice by creating false documents in support of the impugned payments,” EACC said in court papers.

While the investigations are still progressing, sources at the anti-graft watchdog told the Saturday Nation that detectives could go back to court to investigate bank accounts operated by Ms Waiguru.

Speaking in Sagana town yesterday, the ward representatives accused the Governor of throwing the County into financial crisis. “She is frustrating efforts to fight the Covid-19 pandemic by suing to challenge the budget amendment.

The workers have also not been paid their July salaries,” the Baragwi ward representative David Mathenge added.

Additional reporting By George Munene. [email protected]; [email protected]