DPP Haji: Why we withdrew Aisha Jumwa's graft case

Jumwa was facing charges of illegally obtaining Ksh.19 million while serving as Member of Parliament for Malindi between May and October 2018.

According to Haji, the decision to pull the case out of court was prompted by the lack of evidence which he said had been obstructed by the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI).

He further claimed that the decision to charge Jumwa was not based on evidence and he could not allow "the miscarriage of justice".

"We asked for evidence and it was never availed and we had written more than five reminders to the DCI and it was never forthcoming," he said while speaking to KTN on Sunday. 

"DCI said they have evidence to directly link Aisha Jumwa herself to the crime and they availed certain documents that we felt if additional documents were availed then proof could be there to allow us to prosecute her but they were never availed and we had to review the case and withdraw it."

DPP Haji faulted the DCI, accusing them of frivolously running the institution under its former boss George Kinoti, claiming that most cases did not meet the threshold for being charged.

He further disclosed that DCI was not forthcoming with enough evidence on a number of cases and that is when he was forced to make the decision to withdraw the cases.

"We had a number of communications in those files before this decision was made and actually the decision to withdraw was made before the election because we had undertaken quite a number of reviews, we communicated with DCI to ask them to avail the evidence required to allow us make enough disclosure to the court and also prove ourselves right," he said.

"When we saw this was not forthcoming then we had no other alternative but to withdraw these cases. I could not hold any longer to have cases that did not have the desired threshold and did not meet what we felt was sufficient for us to go to court and that's why our posture changed and demanded that DCI provided evidence."

Haji further noted that the division sparked a tiff between his office and the DCI which he claims what the reason behind the cases Kinoti filed against him.

He added that his change of tune also led to his Nairobi home being broken into but he had to lead with integrity and independence and "stand his ground".

"A case was brought against me and the documents were forged and falsified from officers from DCI under his (Kinoti) command. We were depending on the integrity of the office of DCI but that is not what was happening," he said.

"There were 18 cases against me for my removal from office because of being hard and tough on the issue of the decision to charge."