Deputy president William Samoei Ruto’s running mate Rigathi Gachagua is one of those silent moneybags that control the affairs of the country and the Mt. Kenya tycoons must be a worried lot.
For the longest time in history, the Mt. Kenya Foundation have been perceived as the richest with huge sums of money in their account but that perception is quickly changing with the emergence of the man from Mathira constituency.
The anti-corruption court on Thursday ordered that Rigathi Gachagua forfeits 200 million Kenya shillings to the state.
According to judge Esther Maina, the money held at the Rafiki Micro Finance bank were liable for forfeiture to the state since they were proceeds of crime .
Apparently, the money at Rafiki Micro Finance Bank are held in three separate accounts with one holding Ksh773,228, Ksh165 million, Ksh 35 million and Ksh 1,138,142 shillings. All the three accounts are registered under Rigathi’s name except the last one registered under Jenne Enterprises.
“The court finds the funds are liable to forfeiture as ARA has discharged its burden of proof that the funds were received by Gachagua, “
The court while rendering the judgment said that the Kenya Kwanza runningmate did not show the legitimate businesses he did to acquire all the money legitimately as earlier claimed.
The order came in the wake of the Assets Recovery Agency (ARA) telling the court to order the money back to the state since Jenne Enterprises Limited and Gachagua were deeply involved in money laundering.
The Agency added that Ruto’s runningmate had amassed to the tune of 5.8 billion Kenya shillings within 7 years which was traced to county governments, providing services to ministries and business entities.
According to K24, the funds emanate from the Ministry of Lands (Kenya Informal Settlements Programme), state department for Special Planning, Ministry of Health, Bungoma county government, Mathira constituency development funds, Nyeri county government and National Irrigation Board.
ARA further informed the court that after being transferred to companies or business entities, the funds were ultimately moved to a fixed deposit account, which is Gachagua’s personal account.
“That within the said period, there were massive suspicious cash withdrawals, transfers, inter and intra bank transfers from other accounts to the accounts under investigations and other bank accounts owned by MP Gachagua in suspicious complex money laundering schemes,” the agency said as Rigathi maintained that the cash were from legit businesses done.
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