NYS main suspect Benson Gethi Wangui and four others, including three Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) workers, were on Monday found guilty of defrauding the polling agency of Sh105 million allocated for lanterns during the 2013 General Election.
Former IEBC officers Kennedy Gaunye Ochae, Gabriel Ngonyo Mutunga, and Willie Gachanja Kamanga were found guilty of falsifying tender documents submitted by Solarmak Technologies Limited for the provision of solar lanterns to be used during the 2013 elections.
Chief Magistrate Lawrence also found Gethi and Joyce Makena, both directors of Solarmak Technologies, the company at the center of the election fraud, were found guilty.
Gethi and Makena were also found guilty of falsifying a tax compliance certificate provided by the Kenya Revenue Authority’s assistant commissioner of the domestic tax department.
Read: Josephine Kabura, 10 Others Charged Afresh With Ksh791 Million Money Laundering
Gethi is accused of stealing Sh791 million from the NYS.
According to court documents, his mother Charity Wangui Gethi’s accounts included Sh87.7 million, while Samuel Mdanyi Wachenje’s alias Sam Mwadime’s account contained Sh10 million.
Mr Mwadime is a former NYS employee who stole monies from the agency between 2014 and 2015.
In 2021, the High Court ordered Ms Gethi to forfeit to the State Sh97.6 million in her accounts.
Ms Gethi told the court that the said funds were earned from her business entities, but the court said the Assets Recovery Agency (ARA) had proved that the funds moved from NYS prime suspect Josephine Kabura Irungu, to her business associates then to some law firms and eventually to her accounts.
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“It would also be quite a strange coincidence that on the same dates and in the same branch of the same bank, that funds were moving from Josephine Kabura Irungu’s business entities, then the same quantity of funds were being deposited in the accounts,” the judge said.
“Having so found, then the only recourse to the court is to find that as proceeds of crime, they are liable to forfeiture to the State,” justice Ngugi ruled.
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