DPP withdraws Ksh19M graft charges against Cabinet nominee Aisha Jumwa

The Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) has withdrawn corruption charges against Aisha Jumwa – the Cabinet Secretary nominee for the Ministry of Public Service.

Jumwa who was facing charges of conspiring to commit fraud by illegally paying Ksh19 million, had her charges withdrawn under section 87 (a) of the Criminal Procedure Code (CPC).

Under instructions

The prosecution through Senior state counsel Alex Akula informed Mombasa chief magistrate Martha Mutuku that he was under instructions to apply for withdrawal of charges for the first accused person namely Jumwa.

“I have instructions to move the court with an application on review of charges and that is specifically on the first accused person the final directive is to have her name removed and the case against eight suspects who had been charged alongside Jumwa to proceed,” Akula said.

The move to have charges levelled against Jumwa withdrawn was welcomed by the defence team who in a quick rejoinder lauded the move by the DPP with the lead counsel Jared Magolo seeking an apology from the state for having charged Jumwa with corruption charges.

“We welcome the kind gesture from the DPP, we have no objection against the withdrawal however we wish he would offer an apology to our client,” Magolo said.

Mutuku further ordered the matter to be mentioned before her court to facilitate the DPP’s removal of Jumwas name from the charge sheet and allow eight other suspects to plead afresh to the new charges.

Ksh19 million fraud

In the matter, Jumwa is accused of conspiracy to commit fraud through payment of Ksh19 million to Multiserve contractors with respect to tender number MLD/NG-CDF/01/2017/2018 of Malindi NG-CDF.

She has been charged alongside Wachu Omar, Kennedy Otieno, Bernard Riba, Sophia Saidi, Margaret Kalume, Robert Katana and Multiserve contractors.

The offence is alleged to have been committed between May 14 and October 12, 2018, in the Malindi sub-county, Kilifi County.

Jumwa is also facing a separate count of conflict of interest, acquisition of proceeds of crime and money laundering.

The matter will be mentioned on October 17 for further directions.