From left: Beijing Municipal Commission of Transport director Zhou Zhengyu, Nairobi Governor Evans Kidero and Beiqi Foton Motor general manager Wang Jinyu during the signing of an MoU for public transportation at City Hall last year. PHOTO | FILE
What you need to know:
Nairobi governor Evans Kidero on Thursday maintained that the deal that he signed with the Chinese firm did not have any legal effect.
The EACC is investigating claims that Mr Kidero presided over a deal where county officials may have side-stepped public procurement rules to hand-pick Foton for City decongestion project.
Nairobi governor Evans Kidero on Thursday appeared to trash a Sh4.6 billion deal that he signed last year with Chinese carmaker Foton for supply of high-capacity buses.
In a statement issued after a six-hour grilling by Ethics and Anti-Corruption (EACC) detectives, Mr Kidero maintained that the deal that he signed with the Chinese firm did not have any legal effect.
“The document in question, the Strategic Framework Agreement for Nairobi Public Transportation Improvement Programme remains that, a framework. It creates no legal obligations on either party and no money was committed by the Nairobi county government, nor was it ever contemplated that any money would be committed,” he said, adding that any specific agreements would have been subjected to procurement rules.
The EACC is investigating claims that Mr Kidero presided over a deal where county officials may have side-stepped public procurement rules to hand-pick Foton for City decongestion project.
The agency also questioned Mr Kidero over suspicions that as the Mumias chief executive, he may have processed legal fees of Sh300 million and instantly paid Sh280 million to the personal account of lawyer Tom Ojienda for services not rendered
Last year, City Hall said the MoU with Foton would pave the way for the supply of the first 266 buses for the planned metro transportation system, attracting protests from local motor vehicle assemblers who felt they were unfairly locked out.
The investment was to be the first phase of 2,000 buses that Foton was expected to deliver in five years.
Foton initially said it had not decided whether to assemble the buses locally or import ready-made units from China.
On Thursday, Mr Kidero further dismissed accusation by EACC that City Hall, under his watch, had signed another agreement for supply of buses with Diamond Coaches, a company owned by a Guleid Mursal, saying that he only received a non-viable proposal which did not go forward.
Mr Kidero also dismissed allegations that he paid Sh280 million to the law firm of Ojienda and Co for services not rendered when he was the chief executive at Mumias Sugar.
“I can confirm that no such amount was ever approved or paid by myself. For the record, I would like to state that all payments made towards legal fees to this or any other firm that provided services during my tenure were made by the management,” he added.
Lawyer Tom Ojienda has already moved to court to have the EACC stopped from any further investigations into his bank accounts.
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