A raid by DCI detectives at KRA headquarters sent panic down the spine of some officials who were targetted for colluding with traders to evade tax.
The 12th floor of Times Tower which houses the document processing centre, has a cardinal rule that phones are not allowed but some KRA officials had been accessing the room with their handsets which they used to receive bribes and instructions on how to manipulate documents.
When word got out that detectives had raided the building, some employees working in the centre flushed their phones down the toilet to hide evidence of collusion.
“At the data centre, bribes come by the minute. No import or export entry can be processed without money, which is sent and received via mobile money.
Once the money is sent or “withdrawn” through a friendly agent, a broker sends a text message to confirm and
the officers then act and approve the entry,” a KRA insider.
The tax evasion syndicate that led to the arrest of more than 40 KRA officials was unearthed by spies who were planted inside the organisation by the DCI.
Investigations revealed that within the last two months, the employees at the centre of the syndicate had collected bribes of up to Ksh40 million.
Some members of the tax evasion scheme are reported to have been pocketing Ksh 500,000 daily in bribes.
The arrested individuals will be arraigned in court on Monday as the DCI mulls over converting some of the suspects into witnesses.
In some cases, traders would declare fraudulent value or identity of their imports in a bid to undercut the taxman.
Electronics would be declared as agricultural inputs because the latter is not taxed and sometimes high-value vehicles would be declared to be of less value so as not to attract expensive tax charges.