Treasury Cabinet Secretary John Mbadi’s has proposed a controversial way of combating corruption.

The CS is proposing that the proceeds of the illegally gotten resources be invested in the country instead of being squirrelled and stashed in foreign accounts. 

In remarks likely to be perceived as government’s complacency to graft, Mbadi says the country should allow such money to be repatriated back so that it can create job opportunities.

While appearing before National Assembly Budget and Appropriations Committee, Mbadi suggested  that if corruption can not be fought, it was better to allow people who got the illicit money to invest locally arguing  the move would create jobs  for Kenyans and grow the local economy.

 “If we cannot fight corruption and rout it out, we better allow people who have illicit money to invest it here, because they escape to Dubai and developing countries to employ people there.’’

He posed,” What if that money, which is building a mall in Tanzania is from a Kenyan, was building a mall here?

‘‘How many Kenyans would be employed? So I say, this is the most desirable way to fight corruption and root it out,” Mbadi said.

Last year

 The CS hammered his point home by using an analogy of a man who steals a cow and allows his people to feed its meat contrasting this another  thief who escapes with the cow to the bush, where only hyenas can benefit from its carcass.

 Last year, Mbadi claimed government officials have been stealing Sh2 billion daily and implored them to reduce their take by half even as they repatriated their money.

 “So if we are stealing Sh2 billion per day, assuming we reduce the theft, we don’t want to stop it, we just say. If you have been stealing Sh1,000, please steal only Sh500. If you have been stealing a Sh100,000, steal Sh50,000.”

He added, “ If that could happen, I don’t know whether to call it a conscious decision, but if there could be such a decision, ridiculous as it sounds, we would be saving Sh1 billion a day, which would accumulate to Sh365 billion in a year,” Mbadi said at 52 East African Revenue Authorities Commissioners General meeting.

Outspoken Embakasi East Member of Parliament Babu Owino described Mbadi’s utterances as “unfortunate and unbelievable”.

“Those comments, coming from a man holding such a high office in government, should worry us as a country. It simply means that the Cabinet Secretary for National Treasury who should be fighting corruption is now telling Kenyans it is okay for government officials to steal and have the money invested back.

‘‘That is a loose cannon kind of a statement, a dangerous precedence that should be worrying. It is unfortunate and unbelievable,” Owino said.

“Does it mean the government is now legitimising the act of government officers who are stealing from public coffers? I thought corruption was to be fought from the top to the bottom and I believed it was in the government’s interest to tame corruption at all levels.

‘‘The country is in a bad economic state and instead of giving people hope on how the government is curbing the widespread corruption, we are having a CS behaving like he has let go the fight. Instead of telling us who is stealing and what the government is doing about it, he is telling us to legitimise corruption. It sounds like we are in a country where the top is accepting conmanship. I am disappointed,” said Babu.

The MP said it was such a shame for Mbadi to be disclosing that Sh2 billion is being stolen everyday and, instead of working for a formula to curb this, goes ahead to purport there should be a conscious decision that allows people steal less.

Political analyst Alinur Mohammed says it is shameful for a public officer to be seen as to be advocating for corruption. In a country where people are dying of poverty and languishing in joblessness, Mohammed says government officer holding levels of influence like a CS should not get away with such comments that also border moral decay on the top.

“A shopkeeper could have a better reasoning than John Mbadi who happens to be the Treasury CS. His admission of the rampant corruption within government institutions by claiming that government officials have been stealing Sh2 billion daily and going ahead to say they should reduce this by a half is advocating for corruption,” said Mohammed.

“It is unfortunate that Mbadi was among the experts that were tapped to help Ruto reinvigorate the economy and run the affairs of our country. What shall we tell our children if we are the ones advocating for corruption. It is regrettable,” said Benjamin Gathiru, Embakasi Central MP.   

Gathoni Wamuchomba, Githunguri MP, terms Mbadi’s remarks are careless and insensitive.

“I see it as a deliberate attempt to introduce confusion in the Kenya Kwanza administration and when the 2027 election nears, they abandon Ruto and blame him for all the wrongs they have made. 

 “If they are experts as they claim, Mbadi ought to have advised the President on how to fight corruption and to advise the President against the Coffee Brokers levy on coffee, which will be deducted from farmers’ earnings.

‘‘Mbadi is intentionally frustrating the President so that he continues being unpopular,” says Wamuchomba.

This past week, Mbadi disclosed to the National Assembly’s Budget and Appropriations Committee that there has been abuse of the public participation budget, echoing sentiments that had in the recent past been shared by among others National Assembly Majority leader Kimani Ichung’wah in a veiled attack against Kiharu MP Ndindi Nyoro.

 The CS said the figure of the public participation budget has been altered in the past, a move he said shocked him and his fellow colleagues when he was an MP.

 “We used to get strange figures and upon questions, we used to be told that it was the President who allowed, you know you have no way of walking to the State House to confirm and verify the facts and you take it.

‘‘And by the way, most National Assembly’s Budget and Appropriations Committee chairs, if not all, have that unlimited access to the Head of State. So you would imagine that they have consulted,” he said.

 He said Sh18 billion had been put in the budget but during the Gen Z revolt, the money came down to Sh12.9 billion.

Two weeks ago, Ichung’wah and a section of MPs waded into the matter claiming that the budget making process had been abused.

 “Matters budgeting are expressly documented in our Constitution and in particular, matters relating to public participation. There has been practice of the budget committee moving around counties for public participation, they are allocated about Sh2 billion to every county. During this session, this has happened in about 21 counties,”Emuhaya Mp Omboko  Milemba said

Public participation

 Ichung’wah said, “I want to agree with Milemba, it is true the budget public participation process in the budget making process has been grossly abused.

‘‘That is why you find that in a situation where Sh2 billion was set aside for public participation, those who sat in the budget committee found it prudent or imprudent, whatever the case maybe, to put an additional Sh10 billion,”

 But more worrying, according to Ichung’wah, who has previously chaired the committee, is that if the entire Sh12 billion went to counties slated for the public participation, there would be no problem.

He said the problem has arisen because people with vested interests in those committees use that opportunity to put projects in their own counties and constituencies.