The government has taken punitive action against a senior civil servant who had amassed wealth amounting to Ksh138 million.
Through a press release dated Thursday, December 2, Kenya Electricity Transmission Company Limited (KETRACO) confirmed that it was aware of the ongoing investigations involving one of its employees.
The state-owned power transmission firm made it clear that it was collaborating with the relevant investigative agencies to unravel the circumstances under which the employee amassed such amounts of wealth.
The board and management of KETRACO has since taken administrative action and the civil servant has been sent on compulsory leave to pave way for investigations.
"Our attention has been drawn to articles in the local daily newspaper on corruption allegations of one of our senior managers. The board as taken administrative action and the manager sent on compulsory leave," the statement signed by KETRACO chairperson read in part.
"The company is aware of the ongoing investigations on this matter and is fully cooperating with relevant investigating agencies."
The civil servant is said to have bought eight cars and stashed millions of shillings in different bank accounts that was being trailed by the anti-graft agency.
The Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC), in their court documents, detailed that the civil servant had several other real estate empires in different parts of the country including Nairobi and Nakuru. They included rental apartments, farms for commercial agriculture lands and townhouses.
EACC on Tuesday, November 30, moved to court seeking orders to freeze his account. The presiding judge granted them their wish allowing them to freeze the employee's account that had Ksh58.5 million held in several Sacco accounts.
Justice Esther Maina allowed EACC to freeze the civil servant account together with that of his spouse for six months pending the conclusion of the probe.
EACC, in documents presented in court, indicated that the civil servant had stashed a salary of Ksh35.7 million plus imprests of Ksh4.8 million between 2010 to March 2021.
“An analysis of the preliminary investigations has raised reasonable suspicion that considering the respondent’s salary, large and frequent deposits into his bank accounts, shares and deposits in his SACCO account are disproportionate to his legitimate known sources of income and could have been obtained through corrupt conduct,” EACC maintained.
The anti-graft agency argued that the civil servant might have used his influence to award tenders and procurement deals against the country's policy.
His close family members are now even being treated as persons of interest as EACC seeks to recover some of the assets.
