When the High Court froze Wilson Nashon Kanani’s properties, including cars, last year over claims that they were linked to bribes and kickbacks at City Hall, where he works, he was shaken but chose to fight nonetheless.
The man who joined City Hall in 1999 and rose to his current position as the in-charge of outdoor advertising, monitoring, and surveillance first thought the freeze order was a joke until it started affecting his family and his social network.
The man said some friends cut links with him because no one wanted to be associated with a man suspected of graft.
“A few stuck with me, but as a family, we resolved to soldier on because we knew all the allegations were false,” he said.
Mr Kanani said he had made money even before 2016 when the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) targeted his assets for forfeiture to the State.
He said he first attempted to access part of the frozen funds for upkeep and other uses, but the application was dismissed by Justice Nixon Sifuna who told him to await the determination of a forfeiture application by the anti-graft body.
Bank accounts
The 46-year-old Nairobi County employee said he had to adjust his life as advised by the judge and live accordingly.
Mr Kanani said his family was worst affected because they were dragged into a dispute they knew nothing about.
“Their bank accounts were among those targeted,” he said.
Mr Kanani said other sources of income, including 1824, a popular club on Nairobi’s Lang’ata Road, kept him and his family going.
Last week, Mr Kanani had the last laugh when Justice Sifuna dismissed the petition by the EACC, seeking the forfeiture of the assets, including land, four high-end vehicles, and money in bank accounts amounting to Sh643.2 million, allowing him to have them back.
The EACC said Mr Kanani acquired four high-end motor vehicles—Toyota Land Cruiser V8, Mercedes Benz E 300, Mercedes Benz E350, and Toyota Alphard—in a span of five years.
The anti-graft agency investigated his five bank accounts and found that he received cumulative deposits of Sh506 million between January 2016 and October 31, 2022.
Mr Kanani told the Business Daily in an interview that he believes that the whole saga was about witchhunts.
“There was no complainant but EACC itself. The commission didn’t call any witnesses to show that I asked for bribes or kickbacks. Not even an iota of evidence, linking me to graft, was tabled,” he said.
Past conviction
In his judgment, Prof Sifuna faulted the EACC for solely relying on a past conviction of Mr Kanani, which was quashed by the High Court, to link his assets to graft.
“Therefore, the commission’s reliance on that conviction falls, and in the absence of any other evidence, there is no evidence on record in this suit to prove that he or any of the respondents engaged in corruption or corrupt activities as alleged by the commission,” said the judge.
To defend himself, Mr Kanani explained how he acquired the assets and funds and tabled audit reports of the assets, audited accounts, and bank statements.
Mr Kanani explained that other than his salary, he had other sources of income, including businesses run by his wife and inheritance from his late father.
Besides, one of the clubs where he is a co-director earns him a tidy sum.
The 46-year-old joined City Hall in 1999 and laughed off the labelling him as a junior employee. His net salary was Sh93,375 as of October 2022.
Justice Sifuna said in the judgment that there is a mistaken position that in forfeiture proceedings, all the commission needs to do is to allege, and the legal burden of proof is on the subject to explain how they were acquired. “I can’t disagree more,” he said.
According to Justice Sifuna, the burden rests on the party that will lose the case if no evidence is adduced at all on either side.
The judge said the burden to be borne by Mr Kanani to explain is only on the evidentiary burden, which, like a pendulum, will keep swinging between him and the commission as they make accusations and counter-accusations.
The commission targeted the properties allegedly amassed between 2016 and October 2022.
The EACC had claimed that the City Hall employee registered the four companies and used his spouse to disguise and conceal the ownership.
The money was allegedly through kickbacks and bribes. As an officer in the urban planning department in charge of outdoor advertising, monitoring and surveillance.
M-Pesa transactions
The EACC said as part of his job, he would call advertisers asking them to comply with approvals and payments.
Records tabled by the EACC showed that he received M-Pesa transactions totalling Sh750 million in the period under investigation between 2016 and 2022.
He dismissed the submission that the mere fact that he earned a “meagre salary” then he made this wealth through corruption.
“A junior employee who wisely invests his supposedly meagre salary can be wealthier and have more assets than an executive who spends his otherwise humongous salary in leisure and sin,” he said.
The judge further said EACC fell in error in proffering that allegedly meagre salary should be his only legitimate source of income and, therefore, the sole yardstick for rationing his assets.
“I disagree with the position that for a person in employment his known legitimate source of income should be only his salary is not only presumptive but also fallacious,” the judge added.
