Nairobi — The Directorate of Criminal Investigation's Transnational Organized Crime unit is holding fifteen suspects in connection with corruption allegations at the Immigration Department in Nyayo House, Nairobi.
The arrests announced Friday, came weeks after the Cabinet Secretary for Interior Kithure Kindiki ordered a probe following public outcry over officials demanding bribes to process passport applications.
Under the operation launched on October 2, five immigration staff, an intern and nine suspected brokers were arrested.
DCI said its detectives were pursuing other suspects believed to have gone into hiding since the crackdown began.
"In the classic case of grand corruption, members of the public and foreigners seeking passports and work permits respectively have been forced to part with huge sums of money to access services, after the rogue officials took advantage of a temporary system downtime to satisfy their sheer greed for extras," DCI said.
According to the agency, the crooked officials went ahead to plant brokers around the facility, to entice and collect funds from desperate applicants with emergency cases.
The brokers would also target persons willing to pay for preferential treatment at the expense of ordinary Kenyans who procedurally tendered their applications.
Intern implicated
After days of forensic analysis and profiling of the identified suspects, the detectives raided the Department of Immigration Services on Monday, October 2, where five suspects (four staff and a broker) were whisked away for interrogation.
These included Nicodemus Muide, Aloise Gitonga Kiura, Stephen Makokha, Mohamud Khalif Maalim -- a broker -- and Esther Ogega Nyambura alias Pauline Nyangara Ogega alias Carol, an intern at the department.
"Confronted by the facts of the allegations laid against him, Muide reportedly fell ill and was rushed to AAR Hospital along Kiambu Road where he was diagnosed with heart attack and high sugar levels," DCI reported.
He was released on bail to continue with treatment as detectives sought custodial orders for the rest of the suspects at Kahawa Law Courts to complete investigations. DCI said the suspect had since recuperated.
In the subsequent operations at Nyayo House and the Central Business District, another staff member, Joseph Ireri Karani and eight brokers were arrested.
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These are; Abdullahi Abdirahman Ali, Bashir Ore Ibrahim, Damaris Kwamboka Bosire, Charles Mucheru Mwangi, George Karancha Obare, Domiciano Makori Oketch, Isaac Mbulo and Luke Lang'at.
Money trail
Detectives said a trail of transactions by the suspects on their mobile money and bank accounts indicating how money was remitted to the immigration officers and their proxies has since been obtained, with the view of presenting water-tight evidence during prosecution.
The arrest of the 15 comes barely six weeks after four other suspects were arrested on August 25 for soliciting for bribes in the issuance of the passports.
Their arrest was preceded by a series of impromptu visits to Nyayo House by CS Kindiki, who sought to find out why there accumulated a backlog of over 40,000 passport applications and establish measures of clearing the same.
"We will clean up this place from corruption cartels on anyone asking for bribes here. We will arrest and prosecute them. We have already made some arrests and I want to make it clear that this space is not available for corruption," CS Kindiki said.
