Robert Ouko (politician) - The Kisumu 'Molasses Project'

The Kisumu 'Molasses Project'

Troon's second theory based on the allegations of Airaghi and Briner-Mattern, that intermediaries on behalf of Nicholas Biwott, Prof. George Saitoti and others had asked for bribes to facilitate the progress of the Molasses Project and that when these bribes were not paid Nicholas Biwott stood in the way of the project, would also seem to lack any evidential basis. The process and timescale by and over which the decision was taken to bring the Kisumu Molasses project to a halt would also seem to remove it as a likely cause for a dispute in 1990.

Cabinet papers, official records and Dr Ouko’s own correspondence prove that ultimately all decisions relating to the Molasses Project were taken by the Kenyan Cabinet, record that both he and Nicholas Biwott were agreed on the need for the rehabilitation of the ‘Molasses Project’, and attest to the assistance Nicholas Biwott gave him and the cooperation between the two men.

The allegation that Nicholas Biwott championed an alternative tender in order to receive a ‘kickback’ from the project is even more curious as the two companies concerned, the Italian firms ABB Teconomassio SpA and Teconomasio Italiano/Brown Boveri, were both introduced to minister Dalmas Otieno by Domenico Airgahi and both belonged to the same multinational group. Thus there was no rival tender and there could have been no bribe asked for or paid for a company to pitch for a tender against itself.

Nicholas Biwott’s involvement with the Molasses Project ended on 3 November 1987 (when the Kenyan cabinet assigned specific duties to develop the project to the Ministries of Industry and Finance, not to Biwott's Ministry of Energy) over two years before Dr Ouko was murdered and the Molasses Project was effectively abandoned in 1988, the decision being taken by Dalmas Otieno who had replaced Dr Ouko as Minister for Industry following the election of that year, a decision taken nearly one-and-a-half years before Dr Ouko was murdered.

Critically, Troon rejected Dalmas Otieno's evidence and did nor read, or ask for, the Kenyan Government's 'Molasses File' that would have substantiated Otieno's testimony.

Dalmas Otieno, in a witness statement made 21 May 1990, stated, "I personally interviewed Mr Airaghi and I considered he was not competent to handle the project and knew nothing about Molasses. He initially asked for one million US dollars for the feasibility study, he then halved his sum, and eventually settled for 300,000 dollars."