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Deputy chief executive officer of the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission Michael Mubea is a besieged man following a scheme by MPs to block his appointment as the new ambassador to Dublin in Ireland.
Your favourite Weekly Citizen had reported that intelligence reports had indicated that with new broom at the helm of EACC, Mubea was set to go with the next being the director in charge of investigations seen to have been behind poor show at EACC for almost a decade.
Deputy CEO of EACC Michael Mubea
Highly placed sources revealed to Weekly Citizen that when Uhuru Kenyatta appointed Mubea, he was well aware that he would not meet the grade at the vetting table and it was only a ploy used to remove him out of EACC and from the public figure.
Mubea was at one time suspended for 90 days over the sale and transfer of Integrity Centre building. Weekly Citizen has further information, MPs are plotting to stop his appointment on grounds he is facing criminal investigations and his file is being updated before being arraigned in court to face criminal charges. Then chairman Mumo Matemu wrote him a two page letter informing Mubea of the decision.
Mubea was accused of hiding five files whose cases had been reported to the commission together with then CEO Halakhe Waqo over allegations of insubordination.
Mubea criminal charges surround and date back in November 1994, Revak Limited, which was the registered proprietor of the land where the building sits, took an unsecured loan of Sh152 million from Trade Finance Limited.
However, when the financial institution went under and was placed under the Central Bank’s Deposit Protection Fund, a court order was issued securing the loan by placing a charge against the property. The loan remained unpaid raising Sh500 million. A probe that was internally launched to probe the transfer of the house failed to start its work over frustrations a by Mubea.
Mubea was among those to be probed on allegations of improper conduct over the transfer of Integrity Centre where the EACC is based.
Sucked into the ownership saga was Tegus Limited. The EACC questioned how the title deed to Integrity Centre, which was in the hands of the Deposit Protection Fund Board was transferred from the previous owner – Revack Limited – to Tegus.
The DPFB held the title on behalf of investors of Trust Bank, which was liquidated in 2001.
The building changed ownership in June 2013.
The building was improperly transferred to Tegus and Mubea was behind the deal.
Tegus Ltd, through their lawyer Kipkenda and Company Advocates, wrote to EACC claiming that some officials there were forging documents on the ownership of the building.
“Our client gathered information from the ministry of Lands registry that Mr Kipsang and his comrades in crime were in the process of destroying the original files of the property to pave way for the creation of a set of fake documents of ownership. This is driven by the false believe in some officers in Ardhi House that the title to the property has expired,” reads part of the letter.
Integrity Centre was sold to its new owners for Sh400 million in June 2013 while the EACC was a tenant in the building, which was in the custody of the Deposit Protection Fund Board.
Records at the ministry of Lands state the building which stands on 0.4867 hectares of prime land, was estimated to be worth Sh450 million by the government valuer.
Mubea is accussed of blocking investigations into Ruaraka Land Scandal, multibillions-shilling sugar, maize and fertiliser scandals, and corruption at Kenya Revenue Authority and Kenya Pipeline Company.
It is on these grounds Mubea was not named EACC CEO despite applying, after state security teams blacklisted him in the fight against corruption and instead claimed he was an accomplice in the vice.
In the Sh1.3 billion Tokyo Embassy scandal, Mubea and EACC collected shoddy evidence which eventually led to the collapse of the case against former PS Thuita Mwangi.
The report also brought to light several other corruption files Mubea has been sitting on including some linked to prominent drug barons at the coast.
COTU secretary general Francis Atwoli
However, the biggest of the stalled investigations include scandals involving a section of NSSF top management who reportedly lost billions of taxpayers’ money through four construction projects in Nairobi, namely: Hazina Towers, Milimani Executive Apartments, Nyayo Estate Embakasi Phase VI and Tassia that at one time saw Cotu secretary general Francis Atwoli shed tears in public openly claiming EACC was protecting officers involved.Atwoli said looters were targeting wokers money.
By then Mubea was protecting then managing director Tom Odongo and the probe into NSSF projects that saw the parastatal pay billions of shillings in penalties to Chinese contractor Jiangxi International (Kenya) Limited.
Mubea’s technical appointment, according to keen observers is a move to clean up the antigraft commission and pave way for a more favourable environment that would allow the new EACC CEO Twalib Mbarak stamp his authority in dealing with corruption in the country.
Mubea’s operations have been shrouded with a string of dirty undertable deals and many see him as the remaining face of corruption at the antigraft body given his tactics in ensuring that most corruption cases are frustrated.
At one point Mubea otherwise referred to as Mafia by friends and foe privy due to his style of operation, was unceremoniously suspended on glaring allegations that he was compromising operations at the sleuths’ headquarters, Integrity Centre.
The move was aimed at defusing tension between commissioners and Mubea led secretariat team after it emerged that Mubea and some of the juniors in his web were frequently making unilateral decisions behind the commissioners.
Mubea in unprecedented show of financial prowess, influenced his way to be placed as the incharge of the entire operations of the commission, considered to be highly lucrative post which includes directorates of investigations, prevention and legal services.
Since his appointment as the EACC deputy CEO there has been deafening uproar from all corners with numerous complaints from Kenyans that he was right at the centre of shielding suspects or intentionally delaying cases.
Former EACC CEO Halakhe Waqo
Mubea joined the commission in 2013 as the deputy CEO to Halakhe Waqo and prior to joining the EACC, he was a managing partner at Michael Daud and Associates Advocates in Nairobi.
His law firm was linked to suspicious EACC payments running into millions of shillings. The discovery sparked further confusion at Integrity Centre despite admitting that the said cash was channeled to the company’s account he was associated with.
Mubea noted that some unnamed individuals were out to fix him by dragging his name into the stormy scandal. He has also been accused of going to great lengths to impede the prosecution of those found culpable in the multibillions scandals at ministry of Health and the Ruaraka land scandal.
Strangely, his wife Susan Mubea, a senior assistant commissioner at KRA was placed in the mix with claims that she was the link between corruption network at the Kenya Revenue Authority and underworld barons at EACC.
Mubea also surfaced in the Sh5.8 billion Anglo-Leasing scandal where he allegedly colluded with former Swiss ambassador Jacques Pitteloud hoodwink Deepak Kamani, the prime suspect of the scam the above sum and save him from prosecution. Details by insiders indicate that Mubea after an alleged deal remained confident that he would be the next EACC CEO with the exit of toothless former office holder Waqo who retired after totally messing up the anti-graft body. But a damning intelligence dossier left board members in a state of shock and disgusted by the underworld activities of their deputy CEO and that proved his unsuitability to head the sensitive commission.
The report scuttled his dreams further when he was adversely mentioned alongside his former boss Waqo in the fraudulent purchase of Integrity Centre at an inflated cost of Sh1.5 billion.
EACC chairman Eliud Wabukala
Another scathing dossier presented in form of phone call transcripts, images, bank statements and other damning evidences sent the whole board into a deeper shock forcing its chairman Eliud Wabukala to refer his case to the Directorate of Criminal Investigation.
Mubea played a pivotal role when the EACC in what was widely perceived as a deliberate move collected shoddy evidence which in the Sh1.3 billion Tokyo embassy scandal leading to the collapse of the case against former PS Thuita Mwangi.
However, there are senior individuals being haunted apparently after troubled Mubea allegedly took millions of shillings from them to allegedly sugarcoat corrupt deals they were engaged in with a view of having the EACC go slow on them.
One of them is the troubled Homa Bay governor Cyprian Awiti whose leadership has been shrouded with alleged high profile of corruption ranging into billions of shillings. Former National Lands Commission chairman Muhammed Swazuri is also said to be cursing Mubea after his arrest over KeNHA land compensation controversy.
Reports indicate that there was an initial deal between Swazuri and Mubea who was to ensure that the commission goes slow on him but that failed to work after Mbarak recalled almost all sensitive case files from his deputy.
Mbarak took the files after sensing monkey business played by his deputy in handling corruption cases that had robbed the nation billions of shillings which landed into the deep pockets of money hungry few individuals.
Weekly Citizen has learnt that after the files were taken from Mubea and fresh investigations instigated. Insiders at the EACC told Weekly Citizen that Mubea has been making technical appearances from the office immediately after Mbarak stopped him from handling some cases. Those privy to his operations describe him as a totally greedy man who would go to an extent of doctoring invitation letters meant for his chairman Wabukala to attend international events.
Mubea mischievously swapped the names and attended all the major international events.
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