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Former minister Kamau fails to stop corruption case

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Former Transport secretary Michael Kamau. file photo | nmg

Former Transport secretary Michael Kamau was on Wednesday left facing the prospect of being charged afresh with corruption after the High Court threw out his bid to terminate an earlier case against him.

The anti-corruption court declined Mr Kamau’s plea to be acquitted, saying his appeal had been allowed on a technical ground, not his innocence.

The appellate court had found that the EACC was not properly constituted at the time it completed the investigations and forwarded its report and recommendations to the Director of Public Prosecutions.

“It was not based on the manner the investigations were carried out or the innocence of Mr Kamau. That is why the Court of Appeal did not get into the substance of the investigations undertaken by the EACC,” ruled Justice Hedwig Ong’udi.

The EACC had initially charged Mr Kamau with abuse of office and flouting tender regulations in a contract for redesigning a road.

The magistrate’s court then issued an order that he be discharged — the case against him be withdrawn — instead of directing that he be acquitted in line with the Court of Appeal’s verdict that all corruption cases filed against suspects during the period when the EACC had no commissioners could not stand.

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The former minister moved to the High Court seeking orders that the graft cases against him be permanently terminated in light of the Court of Appeal decision.

On Wednesday Justice Ong’udi maintained it was not in dispute that the anti-corruption case against Mr Kamau had not been heard at the time he challenged the case against him before the High Court, and the Court of Appeal.

The case is therefore still pending before the trial court, ruled the judge.

The DPP in opposing Mr Kamau’s application insisted that a rider in the Court of Appeal’ decision stated that parties are at liberty to proceed as they deem necessary on the basis of a properly constituted EACC and within the dictates of the Constitution and the law.

The DPP argued that this meant the proceedings could be withdrawn and lodged afresh in future and that the magistrate’s court was therefore right in discharging rather than acquitting Mr Kamau.

Section 87(a) of the Criminal Procedure Code gives the court discretion to accept or refuse an application by the prosecution to withdraw a case.