The Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) is dangling a carrot to individuals who secured employment in public offices using fake credentials.
The agency has promised to consider alternative dispute resolution mechanisms available in law to resolve their cases if they return all the monies earned as salaries from irregularly acquired positions.
“We have recently realised that there are so many civil servants in this region who have been earning salaries for many years using forged academic papers. We are appealing to those employees to surrender the salaries earned illegally,” said North Rift EACC Regional Manager Charles Rasugu.
The appeal was targeted at public officers in the North Rift, where it has been established that many secured employment in government using fake credentials.
However, the EACC says that in as much as the law permits it to use Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) mechanisms in civil matters for the recovery of assets or funds lost or stolen through corrupt or fraudulent conduct, it does not in any way stop the Commission from recommending criminal prosecution of the suspects.
“For instance, salaries and benefits earned by public officials on the basis of forged academic qualifications are recoverable in full. If a suspect engages the Commission for ADR to voluntarily surrender what they have earned over the years, it is only the civil cases for recovery that will not continue. The ADR mechanism does not in any way waive criminal culpability,” EACC spokesperson Eric Ngumbi said.
A Public Service Commission audit last month revealed that over 2,000 fake academic and professional certificates were used to secure jobs in government institutions.
While decrying the high number of employees illegally drawing salaries from public funds, the regional anti-graft boss said EACC is ready to embrace the Alternative Justice System (AJS) to allow suspects to repay the government the monies earned for the period they have been in employment, and they will be forgiven.
A week ago, EACC instructed government agencies not to pay any dues to individuals who have hastily resigned or sought early retirement after being implicated in fake academic papers probe.
The commission's Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Twalib Mbarak instructed public institutions both at the county and national government levels to halt any such payments until investigations are complete.
“... our major interest is to reclaim all public resources acquired illegally, because jailing people won’t’ restore the money,” said Mr Rasugu.
He spoke at the Court Users Committee conference hosted by the Centre Against Torture-Kenya Foundation in Eldoret.
Editor's note: We have updated this story to reflect the correct name of the current North Rift EACC Regional Manager, who is Mr Charles Rasugu and not Mr Japheth Baithalu as earlier reported. Mr Baithalu is the former North Rift EACC Regional Manager.
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