MPs and the Media: Stop the Hypocrisy, Kibaki Stole Grand Regency Hotel in Broad Day Light As You Watched!

The secret “sale” of the Grand Regency Hotel at a throw away price and the boring subsequent debate has exposed what our MPs and the mainstream media are – they are grossly incompetence and lazy to do even simple research.

The media behave like secretaries – taking dictation from our politicians without questioning a word and reproducing it as “news”. On the other hand, our lazy, tribal and incompetent MPs digest the same raw garbage channeled out by the same media, which disguised as news, and shout from the roof tops pretending to have made new discoveries. The MPs and the media and just two sides of the same coin.

The poor Kenyans are daily treated to a game of musical chairs by our politicians and the mainstream media. And they believe them. As expected, the mainstream media and the MPs are now trying to outdo each other contributing to the debate of the theft of the Grand Regency Hotel – as if any of them had the correct facts regarding the whole episode.

The James Orengos of this world, the Standard, the Daily Nation and its sister Sunday Nation (both of which are Kibaki’s mouthpiece) are now shouting loudest to capture the eye and sympathy of the public yet the deal was hatched and executed by Kibaki himself right under their nose. And none of them noticed it then due to their laziness and incompetence. Kibaki committed the crime of trading off the hotel way back in June 2007 and an year later, the MPs and the media are now shouting from the roof tops pretending to have made shocking discoveries! Please spare us your garbage-spewing mouths.

This is how it all began . . . .

President Kibaki made a three-day visit to Libya between June 4 and 6, 2007. A dispatch from the Presidential Press Service (PPS) to KBC and all the other mainstream media houses plus a posting on the website of Dr Alfred Mutua’s Office of Public Communications clearly stated in back and white that Kibaki and Libya’s President Muammar Gaddafi had signed an Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) Titled "Agreement on Promotion Guarantee and Protection On Investment".

Under the MoU, President Kibaki committed Kenya into granting an exclusive trade pact to Libya, making Tripoli "most favoured nation" status - making it possible for Libyan companies to start at an advantage over investors when competing for lucrative contracts. The Grand Regency Hotel was as among the six projects that the Libyans had expressed interest in the Mou.

The MoU was signed by Kenya's then Minister for Trade, Dr Mukhisa Kituyi, and Dr Ali Elisaue, Secretary General of Libya's General People's Committee for the Economy and Investment. The document was endorsed by Presidents Kibaki and Gaddafi.

Interestingly, Kibaki was committing himself to sell Grand Regency Hotel to a group comprising Libyan investors trading as Libyan Arab African Investment Company almost nine months before Kibaki’s cronies persuaded Goldenberg scandal architect Kamlesh Pattni to surrender it to “the Government” (Kibaki is not the Government). By then, the hotel was still Pattni’s property and there was no indication that he would surrender it to anyone. Why was Kibaki so confident into signing such an MoU based on a property in private hands and why was he so desperate to do so?

Our MPs have offices at Continental House, which they rarely use. They are always out in rallies politicking. The MPs have access to a modern library and research staff services, but they don’t use them. Our mainstream media – the National Media Group and the Standard Group – have well-trained journalists and modern libraries. But they rarely make good use of them.

If the media and the MPs are the public watchdog, they are supposed to scrutinise every deal that “the Government” enters – even with devils - with a microscope. Kibaki stole Grand Regency Hotel in broad day light while our MPs and the media slept on their job.

A PPS dispatch from Libya in June 2007 gave very strong hints about “the sale” of the Grand Regency to Libya (when it was still Pattni’s property) and yet that did not raise eyebrows amongst the lazy and incompetent MPs and media houses (most of them are run by Kikuyu managers and editors who are Kibaki’s loyalist). Why didn’t they smell a rat from the PPS hint?

Kumekucha, which doesn’t have the resources that the MPs, the Nation Media Group and the Standard Group have access to, was the first to expose how Kibaki gave away Grand Regency to Libya in exchange for campaign funds. That was in May. And as expected, some readers who read the story in this blog attempted to pour cold water on it yet the facts in the story were water-tight. The facts in the story were vindicated last week and everybody now seems to be in a hurry to catch up and contribute to a debate they least understand.

Just to re-cap for those who are not conversant with the facts, Kibaki had gone to Libya in June last year to beg money to fund his PNU campaigns and he promised to sell Grand Regency Hotel at peanuts value in exchange of the funds.

How did such funds help the Kenyan public? The money funded Kibaki’s and PNU’s campaigns and had nothing to do with the Kenyan people. The Sh2.9 billion Kimunya claims the hotel fetched will in no way go into public coffers. This was a debt Kibaki incurred and the Sh2.9billion was going to offset that debt. So, how does the public benefit? It’s like when you sell off a vehicle to offset a bank loan you had taken. The cash generated by the vehicle sale will in no way land in your pocket. In this case, Kibaki had already spent the cash he got from Libya in his campaigns and, therefore, not a single cent of the Sh2.9billion will go to the public. That’s the simple mathematics Kimunya is not telling the public.

Kibaki was to hand over the hotel to Libya as soon as he sworn in for a second term in office. But that didn’t happen because Kibaki topped up his votes and this triggered the post-election violence. Libya on the other hand was getting impatient that Kibaki had not honoured his deal and Gaddafi started exerting pressure on Kibaki to deliver what he promised.

On May 19, this year, President Mwai Kibaki flew to Kampala to meet Gaddafi in the thick of a political stalemate back in Kenya brought about by theft of presidential votes. President Gaddafi was in Kampala to commission a new mosque. President Kibaki’s only mission to Kampala was to plead for more time from President Gaddafi for him to honour his part of the MoU.

According to a PPS dispatch to newsrooms, the two leaders held bilateral consultation “to review the status and progress of the implementation of the agreed framework of co-operation between the two countries which was signed in Sirte during President Kibaki's visit to Libya mid last year.” Why didn’t the MPs and the media bother to find out what was this MoU and why was it that important for Kibaki to leave his house on fire to go and meet Gaddafi?

This is where Mr Justice Aaron Ringera, the head of the Kenya Anti-Corruption Commission, and Governor of the Central Bank of Kenya, Prof Njuguna Ndung’u, come into the Grand Regency picture. The two were under instructions to beg Pattni to surrender the hotel in exchange of amnesty over his role in looting public coffers through the infamous Goldenberg scandal. And the media happily reported what was on the face value when Ringera and Prof Njuguna woke up one day and put up a public show with Pattni announcing the Government had “recovered” the hotel from the Goldenberg thief. Media houses didn’t bother to dig beneath the surface. Why?

Ringera knew what he was doing contravened the same law he is paid Sh2.5 million monthly from tax-payers to uphold. Ringera has taken to court small fish (permanent secretaries, civil servants and watu wa mikono) for procuring goods or committing the Government into deals that had been single-sourced without putting up public bids. What’s so different between such deals and the Grand Regency rip off? In fact, Kibaki was signing hot air in the MoU since the hotel was then the property of Pattni! Why would Ringera sanction law breaking by Kibaki – a duly-elected President who has sworn to protect Kenya, her property and the constitution?

Kimunya – Kibaki’s blue-eyed boy – is merely legalising his master’s grand theft. Poor Kimunya. And he prefers to take the heat and filth from MPs and the media – who have made new discoveries - as his thieving master sits pretty at State House. That’s why it’s laughable when I hear MPs and Cabinet ministers demanding Kimunya’s sacking. Who will sack Kimunya? Can Kibaki sack himself?

In addition to Kimunya, Kenyans should unequivocally demand the truth from Kibaki himself, Dr Kituyi and members of delegation that visited Libya with Kibaki. Kibaki, Kimunya, Ringera and Prof Njuguna MUST all be forced to resign by the public and refund the campaign bribe Kibaki received from Libya.

Our MPs – Prime Minister Raila Odinga included - and the media are only shedding crocodile tears to cover up their collective incompetence. Kenyans are being fooled. Where were the MPs, the James Orengos and the media when Kibaki was stealing public property? Which other public property are in the Mou which Kibaki committed himself to give away?

The only MPs who can somehow escape blame are the new ones who were voted in during last year’s General Election. But Raila and the other MPs who were in the Ninth Parliament should give us a break. They were in Parliament when Kibaki stole Grand Regency and none of them raised a finger till now to endear themselves to the public – to be seen to be championing matters of public interest.