Former KPA official links EACC arrest to role in graft fight

A former Kenya Ports Authority (KPA) head of ethics and integrity has linked his prosecution to high-profile corruption cases he handled at the government parastatal.

Mr Peterson Okhako, who has moved to the High Court to stop his prosecution, alleged that he was targeted for successfully investigating and presenting evidence against former KPA employees who are being investigated or prosecuted.

Last week, the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) arrested Mr Okhako, who is also the director of the Ethics Institute of East Africa, over Sh2.4 million he had allegedly received through the consultancy firm from KPA.

In an affidavit filed in a Mombasa court, Mr Okhako says the accusations against him are directly linked to the high-profile cases touching on corrupt dealings he helped investigate at KPA while he was the head of ethics and integrity.

“I was tasked with [investigating] ethical and corrupt dealings undertaken by employees and recommend prosecution of such individuals with the former KPA Managing Director Daniel Manduku, whose case is being handled by the Directorate of Criminal Investigations being one of the high profile cases I was involved with,” he said in the court documents.

His recommendations, he claims, rubbed some high-ranking officials at KPA the wrong way, leading to unwarranted and unsubstantiated investigations being opened against him for supposed conflict of interest while employed at the agency.

Mr Okhako wants Director of Public Prosecutions Noordin Haji and the EACC prohibited from bringing conflict of interest charges against him.

Mr Okhako says he is a non-executive adviser at the Ethics Institute and has no decision-making responsibilities.

The EACC says the suspect failed to disclose to KPA his role and interest in the institute while offering consultancy and training services to the parastatal.

Court documents prepared by the EACC indicate that Mr Okhako will be charged with the offence of conflict of interest, contrary to Section 42(3) as read with section 48 of the Anti-Corruption and Economic Crimes Act No.3 of 2003.

The decision to charge Mr Okhako followed consultations between the DPP and the EACC.

But the suspect now wants the charge sheet quashed, saying he had in 2012 brought to the attention of the KPA his relationship with the institute through a declaration letter that he personally delivered to the then managing director.

“I wrote a letter dated June 6, 2012 declaring my affiliation with the institute and the fact that the said affiliation was not in any way a conflict with the duties and responsibilities I was undertaking at KPA,” he said.

He also argues that he had stated in his letter that if a conflict of interest arose between the two roles, he would immediately declare it but no such time ever occurred.

In the documents, he says that in 2020, he had responded to the claims that have now led to the charges, detailing his roles in the formation and operations of the institute, in addition to disclosing his personal declaration of interest to the KPA.

Mr Okhoka also says that on July 5 he wrote a letter to the DCI, raising his suspicions that the purported ongoing investigations against him were intended to achieve a particular agenda that directly linked his roles as the ethics and integrity officer at the KPA.

“The purported ongoing investigations are to intimidate and get me to drop my bid of following up and see the eventual conviction of known corrupt individuals at KPA that I managed to present evidence against and with an active criminal case being handled by the DCI,” he said.

Court documents he filed show that he worked at the KPA before being seconded to the Bandari Maritime Academy to discharge the same mandate.

He wants the court to permit him to bring judicial review proceedings and scrutinise the investigations and the charges brought against him.

“It is further imperative that the said leave does operate as a stay of any intended arrest, prosecution, charging or in any way commencing or sustaining any criminal proceedings against me with respect to the alleged dealings between KPA and the institute,” he said through Shabaan Associates LLP advocates.

He argues that the intended prosecution lacks a factual basis and described it as an abuse of the law and criminal process.
Court documents show that the consultancy firm was founded in 2008 to offer training and capacity building for public and private ethics

practitioners in East Africa.

High Court Judge Olga Sewe directed that the DPP, EACC, Inspector-General of Police and the chief magistrate be served with the documents.

The case will be heard on July 13.

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