Why do governors and various government top officials always pushing to live a high end life? Just imagine what 26 million can do.
Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission of Kenya have arrested Wajir County Assembly Clerk Osman Mohamed for declining to produce documents on purchase of Sh26m car for the governor.
The EACC are investigating how the clerk single handedly helped the governor to acquire that guzzler with county funds which are meant for development of the county.
According to EACC, a graft ring involving family members at the county conspired to defraud Ksh.26 million in purchase of two luxury vehicles for the county but instead, only one second-hand vehicle was purchased at an inflated price and a balance of Ksh.12 million was allegedly diverted to a spouse’s account for unknown reasons.
Court documents indicate bank accounts of Daayo Construction and General Supplies Limited and Fine Trust Construction Company domiciled at the Kenya Commercial Bank Wajir branch have been frozen for six months.
Equally, the vehicle, a second-hand Toyota Landcruiser v8 purchased at Ksh.14 million has been impounded for inspection and valuation.
The accounts belonging to Osman Abdi Jimale and Ahmed Abdi Jimale — Directors of Daayo Construction and General Supplies Limited — and Yasmin Jama Abdullahi as the Director of Fine Trust Company Limited.
According to EACC, Yasmin is the wife of Osman Abdi Jimale, an alleged nephew of Wajir Governor Mohammed Abdi, with the trio allegedly forming a ring to fleece the county Ksh.26 million.
EACC claims the money had not been budgeted for in the county’s 2017/2018 financial year, but on July 2, 2018 Ksh. 26 million was paid to Daayo for the purchase of two vehicles for the county government.
A day later, on July 3, 2018, the company transferred Ksh.14 million to Cosmos Cars Limited for the purchase of the vehicles and on the same day, the balance of Ksh.12 million was transferred to Fine Trust Limited, a company linked to Osman Jimale’s wife Yasmin.
On July 4, 2018, Daayo and Cosmos Cars Limited got into a sale agreement of a second hand Toyota Land-cruiser at Ksh.14 million shillings — a price EACC claims was overly inflated for only one vehicle instead of two as required by the county government.
To murky the waters, EACC allege the vehicle KCQ 004U Toyota Land-cruiser v8 has never been transferred to the county government of Wajir and remains registered in the name of the dealer Cosmos Cars Limited.
The governor in a statement has dismissed the probe terming it “baseless, political and ill-timed” only meant to distract and influence the Supreme Court judgement on the Wajir gubernatorial race to be delivered on Friday afternoon.