Firm forged documents to win Sh588m Kiambu tender - witness

Two directors of a company implicated in the Sh588 million Kiambu county roads tender submitted forged CVs and degree certificates of its technical staff to secure the tender, a court heard on Thursday. 

The prosecution produced two witnesses that told anti-corruption magistrate Thomas Nzyuki that copies of their CVs and certificates were attached to bid documents submitted by directors of Testimony Enterprises Limited for verification during the tendering process.

The tender in question was issued on February 12, 2018, and awarded to Testimony Enterprise owned by Charles Chege and Beth Wangeci Mburu after quoting Sh588 million.

After the award, the company allegedly gave former Kiambu Governor Ferdinand Waititu a kickback of Sh25.6 million.

 Waititu, his wife Susan Wangari, and members of the tender committee are in court facing graft charges over the irregular award of the tender.

 The tender was for upgrading of various gravel roads in Thika, Limuru, Gatundu North, Juja, and Ruiru subcounties during the financial year 2017-2018.

The prosecution's seventh witness Joseph Kadzenya told the court that on April 26, 2019, he received a call from the anti-graft agency to record a statement after his CV was used in the bid documents. 

Kadzenya, who has a degree in building and civil engineering, said he does not know how his documents ended up in the hands of Testimony directors since he does not know them and has never worked for them. 

He said certain pages were plucked from his CV.

The pages that were removed indicated his working period at Tourism Fund and Society General Surveillance Kenya. He worked at Tourism at the time the issues of the tender arose. 

The witness said he knew it was his CV because of the personal details and the content therein.

The prosecution also cited a certificate he acquired from the former Mombasa Polytechnic, which was fraudulently used by Testimony.

"I have never applied for a job at Testimony. I don't know the directors and I don't know how my documents ended up there," he said.

Another witness Albert Kulumba told the court that he was called in by the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission on June 27, 2019, to record a statement over the case.

The officers at the EACC informed him that his CV had been used by Testimony to secure the Sh588 million tender.

"As I was recording my statement, I was shown the CV attached by Testimony. I was able to identify it because of personal details like my ID number and phone number," Kulumba said.

At the time he recorded the statement, he was working with Dama Services which is not included in the CV. That part he said was edited without his knowledge.

He said the copy of the CV used by Testimony was forged because it did not have some of the details captured in the original.  

Asked whether he reported to the police regarding his CV being used wrongly, he said: "No".

Like Kadzenya, Kulumba said he does not know how his CV ended up with Testimony but mentioned that he had at some time submitted it to one Leonard Ruha.

Ruha was the director of a company called Zagoka Kasamasi Limited. The witness had worked with him.

According to the defence, Ruha worked for Testimony but the witness was not aware of this.

The procurement Boss Justus Bundi who has since testified in the case said due process was not followed in the award of the Sh588M roads tender.

He said the tender evaluation committee failed to comply with the laws relating to procurement.

The committee includes Zacharia Mbugua, Joyce Ngina, Simon Kabocho, Anslem Wanjiku and Samuel Mugo.

They are accused of introducing a new criteria that is a requirement of serialisation of bid documents and filled form tender during the evaluation of the tender for upgrading various roads in Kiambu.

The new criteria, according to Bundi, were not part of the bid document.

The hearing proceeds on March 28.

(Edited by Tabnacha O)