THE KANO COMMUNITY WANTS THE ATTORNEY GENERAL TO IMPLEMENT THE RECOMMENDATIONS OF THE KACC INVESTIGATIONS REPORT ON MIWANI SUGAR FARM

Report Leo Odera Omolo In Kisumu City.

MEMBERS of the Jo-Kano community in Nyando district have sent out a passionate appeal to the Attorney General of Kenya, Amos Wako, urging him to expedite the prosecution case involving the sale of Miwani Sugar Farm, according  to last year’s recommendations contained therein a report  compiled  by a team of Kenya Anti Corruption Commission {KACC}, and submitted to him on Miwani Sugar Company {currently under the official receivership}
Miwani Sugar Farm, investigations report, was among dozens of criminal files forwarded to the Attorney General’s Chambers last year, requesting his office to institute prosecution against a magistrate , an advocate of the High Court, and a number of personalities, for conspiring to sell 9,934 acres of land valued at Kshs 2 billion, belonging to Miwani Sugar Company {currently under receivership} to a private company in a suspicious manner.

It was alleged that the said parcel of land had been fraudulently transferred to Crossly Holdings Ltd.

A Kisumu Resident High Court Magistrate, Mr.Justice Mwera , after listening to argument by both sides in a civil case, said in his judgment that it has been established that the transactions were fictitious and meant to defeat justice, and recommended for action against the persons involved in the alleged fraud by the relevant authorities.

According to the anti-graft body report to the AG, the Kenyan Sugar Board, the debenture holders of the property, were planning to sell the property through competitive bidding when they learnt it had already been sold through auction in a purported execution of a court decree, which the High Court found to have been fictitious.

Any more delays in prosecuting the suspects as per the recommendations of the KACC would provide them with an opportunity to continue with their maneuvers in a concerted effort to defeat justice.

The Jo-Kano community wants the matter resolved with uttermost urgency.

The AG is said to have accepted the KACC recommendations after investigations unearthed a maze of conspiracy involving the suspects.

But yesterday when speaking on behalf of members of the Riwruok Dongruok Jokano Manyien {RIDOKAM}, a welfare organization catering for the Kano sub-clans living in the Kano Plains, Mr. Walter Kitoto Adell, who is the chairman of the group, urged the Attorney General, Amos Wako to expedite the matter, and institute the legal proceedings against the suspects  without delay.

The Jo-Kano people are the original owners of the farm, which for years was used by the Miwani Sugar Company as its nucleus estate . The fertile sugar cane farm was handed voluntarily by the community to an Australian white settler, who pioneered into white sugar manufacturing between 1917 and 1922. At the time, Miwani was known by its original name as Bungu Ka-Marienga.

The company has since changed hands several times ever since 1948, finally landing into the ownership of the Hindocha family. This was at the time when it was jointly owned by the government of Kenya as a parastatal on a 49 per cent shareholding with the a private company, which is associated with the Kenyan business magnate, Mr.Ketan Somaia, which had 51 per cent of the shares.

It owed its creditors billions of shillings in unpaid bills for the farmers who supplied the raw sugarcane, banks, contracted transporters, and its work force slightly in excess of 2000 , at the time it went burst.

Some of the workers were later to become destitute, as the company owed them salaries in arrears for several months, making it impossible for the lower cadre of workers to leave and vacate their houses at the farm, due to lack of money for their transportation back to their rural homes.

Farmers, large and small, were not paid for the cane supplied and crushed and the made sugar sold. The shareholders had entrusted its management to a private company owned and managed by a family of wealthy Asian businessmen in Kisumu and Miwani area.

But it finally went burst several years ago while it was managed and jointly owned by a firm which is associated with the controversial Kenya business magnate, Ketan Somaia and the government of Kenya on a 51 and 49 per cent shareholding.

The community wants to move back into their community farm and ensure it reverted to its original owners, if the government is not interested in the revival of Miwani Sugar Mills, but would contest any attempt top have it change its ownership.

The issue is a volatile one, and the local communities are just being restrained  from invading the farm and splitting it into small parcels of land plots. “It is our property. If its status remained the same and Miwani Sugar Mills is revived, then our people have no problem with that, because it will offer employment to the youths and other workers”, said Mzee Adell.

Mr Adell alleged that some cartel of wealthy Kisumu Asians, known to have perfected the art of land grabbing, have been heard bragging in private places that they will get the Miwani farm through the hook and crock. If the government allows this to happen, it will provoke serious racial hatred and unrest in the area.

Mzee Adell explained that the local communities have no problem with an investor who can buy the entire Miwani Sugar Mills and its supporting farms as well as its newly installed distilleries. “But we are vehemently opposed to the idea of selling Miwani property on a piece meal basis. If this is allowed, then Miwani will never be revived, and put back to production, something which the local community is eagerly waiting for”, Mr. Added went on to say.

Miwani file was among those submitted to the AG in a report covering October 1 and December 31 last year. KACC investigated and forwarded 33 files to Attorney General Amos Wako for prosecution.

But Mzee Adell said that his people were getting impatient because of the delays in  having the Miwani case taken to court. It is a sensitive issue, which needs to be resolved the soonest.

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