• Elijah Gicharu filed the petition at the High Court in Nairobi on Wednesday where he has named the legislator as the respondent.
• The National Government Constituency Development Fund Gatundu South has been named as an interested party.
Image: JOHN KAMAU
A voter in Gatundu South constituency has filed a petition in court seeking to declare area MP Moses Kuria unfit to hold office.
Elijah Gicharu filed the petition at the High Court in Nairobi on Wednesday and named the legislator as the respondent.
The National Government Constituency Development Fund Gatundu South has been named as an interested party.
Gicharu accuses Kuria of nepotism, conflict of interest and contravening procurement procedures in awarding of contracts amounting to Sh170,878,413.
He said the contracts were awarded by the CDF from 2015, when the respondent was the MP.
“In the year 2016, I together with other leaders in the constituency namely Moses Mwihia, Moses Njuguna and Isaac Kamau did a self-driven audit of the Constituency Development Fund, when we discovered serious cases of nepotism and conflict of interest in awarding of the contracts,” Gicharu says in the petition.
“We discovered that most of the contracts had been awarded to companies owned by close relatives of the respondent,” the petition reads.
Among the companies annexed in the petition as having benefitted from the award of tenders are Finishline Construction Ltd allegedly owned by the MP's brother Aloise Kuria, Mwaura Timber Yard Ltd said to be owned by his brother Charles Nguru and Supreme General Traders Ltd owned by John Ngige and James Kuria who are also his brothers.
Others are Lujatech Enterprises Ltd (owned by the respondent’s brother Charles Regeru, Jane Muthoni (Kuria’s sister-in-law) and his nieces Lucy Wambui and Teresia Mwihaki), Numerical Strength Ltd owned by John Ngige Kuria (respondent’s brother) Kiki Holdings Ltd owned by Kuria’s sister Jane Kuria and Kurstan Builders Ltd owned Kuria’s nephew Stanley Kuria Ngugi.
The petitioner claims that Finishline Construction Ltd was awarded a contract of Sh32,531,540 in six schools while Numerical Strength Ltd got contracts of Sh31,525,120 in two schools.
Other contracts awarded to the firms include Mwaura Timber Yard Ltd (Sh15,761,445 for two schools), Kurstan Builders Ltd (Sh14,792,825 for three schools), Lujatech Enterprises Ltd (Sh10,267,955 for two schools), Kiki Holdings Ltd (Sh9,814,240 for two schools) while Supreme General Traders Ltd received a contract worth Sh5,808,468 for Mutungu secondary school.
Gicharu says Kuria directly influenced the awarding of the contracts.
“Some of the companies herein mentioned were created for the purpose of carrying out business with the Interested Party with the influence and support of the respondent,” Gicharu says in the petition.
The petitioner denies politics in his petition, saying he was exercising his civil duty of seeking transparency and accountability from his leaders.
He said he resorted to go to court after his earlier attempts to have the MP investigated delayed.
On March 9, 2017, the same petitioner presented a petition to the Ethics and Anti-corruption Commission asking for investigations into the acts of the MP and his friends, a probe he regretted has dragged.
The petition was followed by peaceful demonstrations in Gatundu town as residents pressured the Judiciary to fast-track the process of having the parliamentary seat declared vacant.
Edited by Henry Makori