The Court has ordered the former Nairobi County Governor Evans Kidero to pay Kenya Revenue Authority Sh427.2 million tax after an audit on his financial, business affairs.
The ruling by Justice David Majanja followed an audit by the Commissioner for Domestic Taxes on the financial and business affairs of the former governor.
Despite the former governor and the Commissioner reaching a consensus that funds raised for political party campaigns are not chargeable to tax, both parties failed to agree on whether Kidero had demonstrated the funds raised had actually been expended in politics.
Separately, the Court of Appeal blocked the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) from searching and valuing multi-million properties belonging to former Nairobi governor Evans Kidero.
Three judges agreed that the search by the anti-graft body can wait for the outcome of the appeal filed by Kidero and his companies.
The former Nairobi County boss rushed to court after EACC issued him with fresh orders in July last year, seeking to visit several of his properties with plans to inspect and value them.
The properties targeted include Gem Investments, Gem Apartments and Gem Suites.
Kidero argued that continued investigation, inspection and valuation of his properties, while the case was pending before the Appellate court, was an abuse of the court process.
“In our view, the applicants’ appeal is arguable and is not frivolous as correctly held by this Court differently constituted in a previous application. We have no reason to hold otherwise,” Justices Roselyn Nambuye, Asike Makhandia and Jamila Mohammed said.
Other properties EACC is seeking to investigate are the estate of the late Abigael Kidero, Gem Apartments, Gem Suits, Argenti Limited and Paul Aoi. Orders were issued after Kidero lodged an appeal faulting the anti-graft commission, saying it went overboard while seeking to conduct a search at his homes and offices three years ago.
EACC’s new move against Kidero’s wealth and intends to inspect and evaluate properties he acquired when he was a private citizen and more particularly when he was MD of Mumias Sugar Company.
Kidero says he received some letters dated June 17 and July 6, 2021 from EACC and from its content, it is apparent that the commission is going to inspect and evaluate his properties.
Through Senior Counsel Tom Ojienda, Kidero argued that if the orders were not issued, EACC would conduct ‘illegal inspections and valuations’ of other properties not listed in an earlier schedule supplied to him.
Kidero maintained that the warrant obtained by EAAC on September 19, 2018 was illegal and issued in violation of the law.
EACC had defended the plans to search and value the properties saying an earlier order, which Kidero contested, was about himself and the anti-graft body could not use it to search his other properties.
