Ministry on spot over Sh25million legal fee in Anglo leasing

The ICT Principal Secretary was yesterday hard pressed to explain why his ministry paid Sh25 million to a legal firm without a contract.

MPs queried why the firm was single sourced to represent the Government in the High Court of Justice (Queens Bench Division) England on Anglo Leasing related contracts.

The audit queries were raised when ICT and Innovation Principal Secretary Victor Kyalo and his Broadcasting and Telecommunication counterpart Stanley Itemere appeared before the National Assembly’s Public Accounts Committee.

According to Auditor General Edward Ouko, the ministry deposited Sh4 million in a local law firm on agreement that it contracts services of a firm in England to handle the case.

The England firm, however, went to court to demand for more money after handling the matter.

“Although the ministry paid Sh25 million to the Attorney General for onward transmission to the law firm, no evidence of any contractual agreement between the ministry and the law firm was availed for audit review,” reads the audit report.

“In the absence of the contractual agreement, it has not been possible to establish how the fee of Sh25 million was arrived at.”

Mr Kyalo said the decision to single source was because of the urgency of the matter since they had already been sued over the controversial contract.

“The ministry single sourced the firm after it was already sued by the company. We were already sued and were in a hurry to have somebody represent us in the matter,” he said.

The ministry was also taken to task for irregularly giving out Sh34.8 million to Kenya Yearbook Editorial Board.

A Sh28.2 million payment to Huawei for provision of project management services on behalf of the Government was also queried as there was no contractual agreement. A review of the matter revealed that the ministry made a further payment of Sh6, 716,103 to the firm.