High profile cases amounting to Sh224 billion pending in court - DPP

 

The Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions released its annual report on Monday highlighting its activities from 2017 – 2020.

The report was handed over to President Uhuru Kenyatta on Monday at State House by DPP Noordin Haji.

According to the report, the DPP had prosecuted 135 high impact cases as of June 30, 2020, involving more than Sh224 billion, which is still pending before the courts.

The cases involve large sums of money, senior government officials and cases of significant public interest.

Haji said at least 57 per cent of these cases were registered in court between January 2018 and June 2020 while 43 per cent were registered before 2018.

Cases registered from June 2018 up to date involved amounts totaling to over Sh157 billion whereas cases registered in 2017 and earlier involved amounts totaling to Sh67 billion.

“This is a clear illustration of the concerted effort put by the ODPP in collaboration with stakeholders in the fight against graft,” Haji said.

Haji said 53 cases involving top government officials were registered during the period covered by the report.

These officials included seven CS and PSs, 11 governors and Senior County Officials, 22 directors and CEOs, seven MPs, one Deputy County Commissioner and five MCAs.

In this year, two cases amounting to Sh1.2 billion involving government officials are in court.

In 2019, the prosecution team filed 26 high profile cases, amounting to Sh140 billion, compared to 49 cases of the same filed in 2018 amounting to Sh16 billion.

While receiving the report, the President asked Haji to focus more on the successful prosecution of high-profile cases especially those involving misuse of public resources.

Uhuru said that it is only through successful prosecution of such cases that the agency will win and retain the confidence of Kenyans.

"Confidence is a fleeting thing. If people don’t see results, that confidence can also evaporate. It is therefore important that results are also shown so as to justify the investments we are putting in," he said.