Nicholas Biwott - Controversy

Controversy

Nicholas Biwott’s name has been raised, ‘perhaps unfairly’ by his detractors both inside and outside Kenya regarding several controversies all which have date their origins to the years 1990-91. His supporters maintain that the allegations, none of which have ever been proved, arose from the campaign at the time to introduce multi-party democracy in Kenya coupled with Biwott’s association with President Moi.

Biwott was named by Scotland Yard detective John Troon as a person of interest in the 1990 murder of Kenya's Foreign Affairs minister Robert Ouko. Troon’s theories and the basis for them as to the motives for the murder have since been criticized.

Ten government officials, including Biwott, were held in police custody for questioning for two weeks in November 1991 but a Kenyan Police investigation concluded that there was no 'evidence to support the allegations that Biwott was involved in the disappearance and subsequent death of the late minister Dr. Robert John Ouko'.

In December 2003, Biwott issued a formal complaint against New Scotland Yard through his lawyer on the basis that Troon's investigation was 'fundamentally flawed and, in many cases erroneous' and called on New Scotland Yard 'to investigate Troon' and to issue an apology.The request was ultimately turned down in December 2004 by the Metropolitan Police as the original investigation 'did not involve any UK "victim", potential suspect, or even witnesses', and because 'the resources of the Metropolitan Police are limited'. Another reason given for the refusal by the Metropolitan Police to review the case was that the Kenyan Parliamentary Select Committee was investigating the death of Dr Robert Ouko and that it was 'open to Mr Biwott to make any representations he wishes to that Inquiry'. The Select Committee's proceedings, however, were abruptly terminated as Nicholas Biwott began to give his testimony.

To date, the allegation that Biwott was involved in the murder of Dr Robert Ouko has never been factually substantiated.

In 2000, a Nairobi court awarded Mr Biwott record damages of Sh30 million arising from a case in which he sued a British journalist, Chester Stern, and others for linking him to the Ouko murder in a book entitled 'Dr Iain West's Casebook'. Chester Stern and the book's publishers, Little Brown, stated that they would "vigorously defend" the action but ultimately they did not do so and the case was uncontested. Earlier Biwott won Sh10 million from Bookpoint, a popular Nairobi bookshop, for stocking copies of the book Dr Ian West’s Casebook.

In 1993 the ‘Goldenberg scandal’ came to light when the Kenyan government was found to have subsidised exports of gold by paying a company, Goldenberg International Ltd (GIL), 35 percent more (in Kenyan shillings) than the foreign currency earnings supposedly derived from the sale of gold., a scheme had begun in 1991 and is estimated to have cost Kenya the equivalent of more than 10 percent of its annual Gross Domestic Product. A Commission of Inquiry headed by Mr Justice Bosire reported its findings in October 2005 stating that Sh158.3 billion of Goldenberg money had been transacted through 487 companies and individuals. 1,559 ‘Adverse Notices’ were issued against companies and individuals but although Nicholas Biwott was included on that list he was only mentioned directly or indirectly in three of the reports 847 paragraphs and the report, together with subsequent revelations would seem to absolve Biwott of any involvement in the scandal.

The Report of the Judicial Commission of Enquiry into the Goldenberg Affair (to which Nicholas Biwott was not summons to appear) states on para 511 that Lima Limited, of which Biwott was shareholder and director, was 'said (to) have received Kshs.6,300,000.00 from GIL'. However, it was subsequently revealed that the payment to Lima Ltd, a company that sold farm machinery and equipment, was made not from GIL but by Tandui Estates Ltd for the purchase of farm equipment, including a number of tractors and other machinery. Paragraph 693 of the same report mentions Biwott in conjunction with a payment of KShs. 6,000,000, which involved Trade Bank Ltd, Pan-African Bank Ltd and Liabilities of H.Z. & Co. Ltd. The Commission concluded however, that 'no moneys of Goldenberg were involved'.

Biwott is now but one name on a long list of Kenyan politicians and civil servants associated with the Moi era to have travel restrictions imposed on them by the United States and the UK including most recently, in October 2009, Kenya's Attorney General Amos Wako, in what has been described by Kenya's Foreign Minister Moses Wetang'ula as "megaphone diplomacy".