The DPP has denied reports that it has halted the extradition of former Kenya Power CEO Samuel Gichuru to Jersey Island to face corruption charges.
According to local media, the DPP has halted the extradition process.
However, in a statement issued on Sunday, DPP Noordin Haji stated that the matter had been postponed due to Gichuru’s illness.
“The ODPP has not made the decision not to proceed with the extradition process. The extradition have been held in abeyance or postponed on account of medical condition of the fugitive,” Haji said.
“According to a medical report availed to the ODPP and extradition court, Gichuru is critically ill.”
Haji stated that postponing extradition was an internationally accepted principle.
“Considering the medical condition of Gichuru, the foregoing provisions of the London Scheme aptly apply. This is not the first time that the medical condition of a fugitive has been used as a basis for abeyance or postponement of extradition,” he said.
“The extradition proceedings against Gichuru shall proceed should his medical condition permit.”
The DPP reiterated that the proceedings had not been halted but were held in abeyance due to his medical condition, and that there was no selective justice in this case.
The extradition proceedings against the co-accused, Chrysanthus Okemo, are still ongoing, and the extradition court will rule on whether he is eligible to surrender on November 30, 2022.
The Supreme Court granted the DPP permission to initiate extradition proceedings against former Cabinet Minister Chris Okemo and ex-Kenya Power CEO Samuel Gichuru in 2021.
They will be extradited to Jersey Island and charged with theft and money laundering.
Justices Martha Koome, Mohammed Ibrahim, Smokin’ Wanjala, and Njoki Ndung’u ruled unanimously that extradition proceedings are criminal in nature and that authority rests with the DPP, not the Attorney General’s office, as previously held by the Court of Appeal.
Both Okemo and Gichuru are accused of accepting bribes from foreign businesses that contracted with KPLC and concealing the funds in Jersey by instructing the foreign contractors to make payments into the bank accounts of a Jersey company called Windward Trading Limited.
It is also alleged that Gichuru was the beneficial owner of the Jersey company, which he controlled through agents, and that money paid to the company’s bank account was distributed according to the instructions given by Gichuru’s agents, including to personal accounts in Jersey held by Okemo and Gichuru.
Okemo is charged with thirteen counts in the Royal Court of Jersey relating to transactions in accounts committed in the Island of Jersey under Jersey law between July 1, 1999 and July 1, 2001.
Gichuru, on the other hand, is charged in the same court with forty counts of violating Jersey law on the Island of Jersey between 1991 and June 28, 2000.
