The Elgeo-Marakwet dam scandal was so sweet that when the officials in the KVDA read the contract, they saw how they would treat their ‘girlfriends’ and saw nothing wrong in the document.
But when the document landed on the then Attorney-Generals Githu Muigai desk he was shocked after he noticed some red flags in the contract document and immediately wrote to Treasury CS Henry Rotich seeking his intervention.
The AG had noticed that there was a subsection in the contract that would have allowed the financier to seize Kenya’s assets abroad if Nairobi defaulted.
“This article is unlawful and should be deleted as it gives the lender the right to file a number of proceedings contemporaneously in several jurisdictions relating to the same matter,” Prof Muigai added.
But what happened?
However it appears some people were just seated zombies waiting for the money to be channeled and take their ‘girlfriends’ out.
Despite warnings, It emerged that the due diligence that the former AG had advised was undertaken between April 25 and May 3, 2017, three weeks after the contract had already been signed.
The due diligence was in relation to the financial, technical and legal competence of CMC di Ravenna to carry out the contract to completion.
In order to have the due diligence on the company undertaken, representative from the AG’s office accompanied KVDA officers to South Africa where the company is.
What did they say?
When they came back they had some ‘good’ news to Kenyans.
“It is our professional opinion that CMC di Ravena has a good standing … to implement Arror and Kimwarer multi-purpose dam projects,” the officials said in their report.
However,after 16 months later the KVDA officials realized they had messed things up after treating their ‘girlfriends’ and now had to make things right.
In order to cover up their misdeeds, KVDA officials wrote to Attorney-General Kihara Kariuki on September 17, 2018 seeking his “concurrence” with the due-diligence report.
In his letter to Mr Kihara, Mr Kimosop explained that KVDA had not done due diligence because “the financiers had set out stringent timelines and there was need to secure funding after consultations with the relevant government authorities”.
He also said due diligence had been undertaken on CMC di Ravenna after it was given the Itare Dam contract in Molo.
And that is how things happened.