Immigration crackdown has loopholes

I hardly know whether to be delighted or sad for Kenya that foreigners might be the first to face a corruption-free public service in our nation. But I do know that the clean-up at immigration holds the potential of generating a mayhem of personal tragedies.

For there is a sense in which many bright eyed and bushy tailed foreigners arrive as sitting ducks: being those birds that float on lakes and rivers simply ready to be shot for dinner tonight.

As it is, I came to Kenya for a consultancy, but never left, seeing gaps in my own industry that prompted me to find a business here. Some 11 years onwards, I am still in Kenya, as an adopted home that was never in my life plan. My children have grown up here, my life has passed here.

But I learned the hard way about corruption, and my work permit was one of the early casualties. I first applied for that investor permit in 2007. I needed to show I had assets. I needed to show I had invested. I needed to show a real and live business, with employees and bringing value. I read the rules, did what I was supposed to do.

But I ended up, two years later, on the 7th floor at Nyayo House being told I was to be locked in a cell and deported. The pit that got me there was my former office manager. She had already been fired by then for comprehensive fraud. Yet as that new drama unfolded, it turned out she had also stolen Sh400,000 for that, right from her very first weeks in the job.

For instead of submitting my own fully documented application, she had, instead, filed another. Complete with my faked signature, it claimed I was pretty much without assets, but starting a business to give to her – I still smile at that last bit. When immigration finally tracked down that sorry form, it was, indeed, so ridiculous, it was a jaw dropper.

It got rejected, not surprisingly, and unbeknownst to me.

My side, my full and legitimate pack left the office for immigration, and some weeks later a paper was given to me by my manager from immigration - it had its heading - confirming the approval of my application and stating that I needed to pay Sh200,000 to immigration and additionally buy a Sh200,000 insurance bond.

It’s obvious now how she scooped up the (doubled) Sh200,000 for the insurance bond – this was a thief who even faked the banking stamp on our PAYE payments for a year.

But what still intrigues me is how she got the money from the banker’s cheque to immigration. Yet, for two years, I travelled and lived with that permit stamped into my passport, blissfully unaware it was a fake, until I went to renew it. Eventually the investigation ended, a legitimate investor permit was issued, and I have had five since, have employed hundreds of Kenyans, trained thousands. But it was a nasty con.

Yet, as our Immigration minister limbers up to flush out the work permit fakes, it’s worth noting that the immigration staff never took a single action against her. Instead, she happily went off into politics, even standing, unashamedly, some years later, as a Women’s Rep, having built a taxi business on her multiple thefts and acts of fraud.

And here’s my problem with this particular drive. For of course there are illegal immigrants in Kenya. Of course some have sought out fake papers because they don’t qualify. But do we really believe those ‘illegals’ are now going to queue up at Nyayo House and be audited? Of course they aren’t.
The only actual fakes this exercise is going to find are from the suckers like me, who truly believe they are genuine.

So will immigration then catch the con artists and put them out of action? Or will it now be deporting the conned as a crowning glory?For that makes a difference. Ducks lay eggs, if they survive. Or we can just cull the conned and be done with their businesses - as if anyone runs businesses in Kenya without ever getting stolen from.