Kenyan President Vows to Press On With Crackdown on Corruption

(Bloomberg) -- Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta said his government will continue a crackdown on corruption that has brought some of his most senior ministers into investigators’ sights.

The authorities are intensifying their efforts to curb graft, which Kenyatta has described as a threat to national security, to make more funds available for the president’s so-called Big Four agenda -- a plan to boost manufacturing and farm output, as well as access to housing and healthcare. That’s as the government struggles to contain borrowing in line with International Monetary Fund recommendations.

So far the authorities have questioned four cabinet ministers, including Treasury Secretary Henry Rotich, as part of a probe into dam-construction projects in which the public prosecutor suspects government funds were misappropriated. On Tuesday, detectives arrested Samburu county Governor Moses Lenolkulal in connection with alleged conflict of interest, the third detention of a county chief by the country’s anti-graft agency.

“There will be no turning back on the war against corruption,” Kenyatta said Thursday in a state-of-the-nation address in the capital, Nairobi.

The anti-graft campaign has caused divisions within the ruling Jubilee Party, with lawmakers allied to Deputy President William Ruto accusing his opponents of linking him to some scandals to try and undermine his ambition to succeed Kenyatta in 2022.

Kenya dropped one position to rank 144th in Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index last year.

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