Ex-PS jailed over Sh283m cemetery land scandal set free after successful appeal

By , K24 Digital
On Wed, 23 Sep, 2020 20:29 | < 1 min read
Sammy Kirui
From left: Alexander Musee, Mary Ngethe and Sammy Kirui in court on Wednesday, September 23, 2020. PHOTO | SHEILA MUTUA
From left: Alexander Musee, Mary Ngethe and Sammy Kirui in court on Wednesday, September 23, 2020. PHOTO | SHEILA MUTUA

Former permanent secretary in the defunct Ministry of Local Government, Sammy Kirui, has been set free after a successful appeal.

High Court judge, John Onyiego, in his judgement found and held that the former PS played no vital role in the procurement process in which Nairobi City Council lost Sh283 million.

But Justice Onyiego found former Nairobi City Council legal officer, Mary Ng'ethe, and her co-appellant, Alexander Musee, guilty of the offence and subsequently upheld the judgement issued by the Anti-Corruption Court.

Now Ng'ethe and Musee will serve the remainder of their respective jail terms.

Ng’ethe and Musee was found guilty of failing to adhere to procurement laws and giving misleading information to the tender committee for the purchase of 120-acre land meant for a cemetery in Mavoko, Athi River in 2009.

Further, they were found to have used a false valuation report to award the tender.

Besides the three-year jail term for each of the four, Nairobi Chief Magistrate Douglas Ogoti ordered Gakuo and Kirui to pay a fine of Sh1 million each.

But Ng'ethe was ordered to pay Sh52 million and Musee Sh32 million failure to which they would serve an additional one year in jail.

Ogoti ruled that the four ought to have used their positions to stop the illegal acts but they chose not to, leading to loss of taxpayers’ money. 

The judge dropped the application for appeal for the former Town Clerk, John Gakuo, who died in prison.

The late Gakuo had been jailed for three years for abuse of office charges.