Former Cabinet Secretary for the National Treasury Henry Rotich is demanding Sh. 3 billion compensation from the government in a law suit that he has filed. Rotich says that the government ruined his life by prosecuting him in 2019 over the Sh. 63 billion Arror and Kimwarer dams scandal.

According to a report that appeared in the Sunday Standard, Rotich argues that the prosecution ruined his health and family, and destroyed his employment prospects. In the court papers, Rotich has cited the Attorney General (AG), the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), and the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI).

“The charges were based on accusations made by the third defendant (DCI), which were based entirely false and initiated without evidence, as was ultimately proven when the charges were dismissed,” he says.

“I was acquitted on December 4, 2023. I have suffered due to malicious and baseless prosecution initiated against me by the defendants… The ordeal of being wrongfully prosecuted has profoundly affected my mental and emotional well-being. I lived in constant fear of imprisonment and the destruction of my reputation . Sleepless nights and frequent anxiety attacks became part of my daily life, and I am still working to recover from their effects.”

Rotich was acquitted with eight others after Justice Esther Nyutu ruled that they had no case to answer. The court ruled that the evidence that had been presented in court was insufficient.

Rotich had been charged with nineteen counts. These included what the prosecution termed as unlawfully executing loan agreements for the construction of the Arror and Kimwarer dams.

During the trial, the prosecution had declined to question 41 witnesses who had testified in the matter, with Justice Nyutu condemning the prosecution for their failure to cross examine the witnesses.

Rotich had been initially charged alongside current Central Bank of Kenya Governor Kamau Thugge. Thugge’s charges were however dropped by former Director of Public Prosecution Noordin Haji in 2021 after he opted to be a State witness against his former boss Rotich.

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Rotich and Thugge had been arrested in 2020 alongside eight other top public officials over the dams’ scandal that saw taxpayers lose Sh. 21 billion paid out to a bankrupt Italian firm for the projects which never took off.

The government made advance payments of Sh. 19 billion, including the Sh. 11 billion in unnecessary debt insurance, which prosecutors said was shared out in accounts belonging to the conspirators and their agents.

“I was wrongly charged on matters that belonged in completely other Ministries and State departments and were very far away from the National Treasury,” Thugge had said when he appeared before the National Assembly’s Finance and Planning committee for vetting for the position of CBK Governor which he now occupies.

“The Director of Public Prosecution Noordin Haji looked at the charges and dropped them and made me a State witness.”