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Now’s the time to keep our eyes peeled over new state contracts
History and experience have taught us that outgoing regimes will always try to approve and push through questionable deals to lock in gains — especially in this period when Parliament is not sitting.
We need to be extra vigilant with contracts and decisions made between now and the time a new Cabinet will have been appointed.
History and experience have taught us that outgoing regimes will always try to approve and push through questionable deals to lock in gains — especially in this period when Parliament is not sitting.
If past trends are to go by, this is the time you see last-minute purchases of goods and hurried signing of dodgy contracts.
I still remember how the management of the Central Bank of Kenya in 2002 hurriedly signed a multi-billion-shilling currency printing contract with De La Rue just two days before former President Mwai Kibaki was sworn in.
I also remember how, just weeks before President Daniel arap Moi left office, the National Treasury issued billions of shillings worth of contractor bonds to settle dodgy and questionable pending bills owed to politically-connected contractors of that period.
Cronies
The window between now and the time the next Cabinet sits, is what Cabinet secretaries and permanent secretaries usually exploit to hurriedly pack boards of parastatals with their cronies.
A look at the last three issues of the Kenya Gazette will reveal the high number of appointments that seem like a scramble to fill positions before the next administration comes to town.
Clearly, the stakes in this year’s presidential contest are high — not only because President Uhuru Kenyatta is going home, but especially because many influential business groups and interests are hedging their bets on the outcome of the contest even as they try to figure out how their fortunes are likely to be affected by the change of government.
How is the new administration likely to impact on the power, influence and stranglehold that China, Chinese contractors, and their local allies have maintained over large infrastructure projects and deals in the past 10 years? It is a pertinent question because China has been an election issue during the campaigns.
This is a high-stakes affair for corrupt elites because agents and middlemen for the big Chinese contractors become overnight billionaires on wealth made from peddling political influence.
Only occasionally bursting into the news, the struggle between politically well-connected elites for gatekeeping roles and opportunities in this space has been one of the most intense political struggles in Nairobi in the last 10 years.
Presidential contest
The stakes in outcome of the presidential contest are extremely high for the elites in this space because just as what we saw after former president Mwai Kibaki left State House, many middlemen and gatekeepers aligned with that administration were shunted from the feeding trough. Don’t we all know the stories about the gatekeeper fights over projects like the Standard Gauge Railway, the police telecommunications and surveillance plan and the Greenfield airport project? The stakes are high because, depending on the outcome of the presidential contest, there will be a major rearrangement of the deck on the Titanic as new corrupt elites emerge and start to scramble for ringside seats in this very lucrative arena.
In the energy sector, independent power producers are hedging bets and trying to figure out and untangle how the outcome of the presidential contest is likely to affect their fortunes. What will become of the on-going renegotiation of power purchase agreements? Will the moratorium which the outgoing administration slapped on new power purchase agreements and independent power producers projects hold?
At Kenya Power, there is an on-going reform management and effort to overhaul the procurement regime for critical supplies such as poles, transformers and meters. These changes are being implemented against the backdrop of heavy political undercurrents. The stakes in the outcome of the presidential contest are especially very high for a coterie of well-connected merchants and their Chinese allies who have dominated the procurement of critical supplies at this strategic national utility.
As things stand, the hiring of a new CEO is still in abeyance. From what I gather, the board went to the international marketplace, recruited a professional, and gave the names to the Ministry of Energy.
Within the Coast region, stakes are high over and explosive subterranean fight over control of the Japanese-built second container terminal. One side of the political divide is pushing transfer of control to a new entity co-owned by Kenya National Shipping Line and the Mediterranean Shipping Lines, while the other side wants the terminal to be bundled together with the three Chinese-built ports in Lamu and then concessioned to an international operator through competitive bidding.
The outcome of the presidential contest will also hold stakes for anti-corruption authorities such as the Asset Recovery Agency (ARA) and the Directorate of Criminal Investigation.
ARA has blocked billions of shillings belonging to two Nigerian fintechs under suspicion of money laundering. The Nigerians believe it is political. Clearly, they are big stakes in the outcome the presidential contest. You got to let the music play.