Jacinta Mwatela: Reggae lover who helped unearth Kenya’s biggest scandals

This story has significance for readers across Kenya and beyond.

Dressed in a yellow, polka dots top and a navy blue bucket hat, accentuated by a beaded necklace, Jacinta Wanjala Mwatela shuffles from one song to another from legendary Jamaican reggae icon Bob Marley in a smooth, silky voice belying her age.

Without skipping a beat, she sprightly hums over the lyrics as her eyes light up through her spectacles, bringing out a youthful vibrancy not usual for a 72-year-old.

Standing up to government mandarins, unearthing irregularities in operations at the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) and a stickler to the rule of law; Bob Marley songs have come to define her life.

Known for her uncompromising personality, Ms Mwatela straddled the CBK for 32 years, joining in December 1977 as a graduate trainee before rising through the ranks to become a deputy governor and at some point headed the regulator for a year, albeit in an acting capacity.

Controversial businessman Kamlesh Pattni, former Finance minister Amos Kimunya, former head of public service Francis Muthaura, and Artur brothers are some of individuals who found the going tough in their encounters with the University of Nairobi alumna.

For her resoluteness, she paid the price as she was tossed from one department and office to another at the CBK as her constant questioning of how the regulator was being run made her a marked person.

From export and foreign trade divisions under the Exchange Control department, to the bank supervision department, estates department, and deposit protection department, Ms Mwatela’s CBK stint was a bureaucratic merry-go-round.

But whichever office she found herself in, the staunch Catholic smoked out financial illegalities involving tax evasion, money laundering and regulatory breaches which gave rise to famous scandals like the Goldenberg and Charterhouse Bank sagas.

“It was not an easy journey but I made sure I stuck to professionalism and never departed from it. I worked in all sorts of departments and areas but I believe I always gave my best wherever I was taken,” she tells Sunday Nation.

“I was not only being isolated for my honesty and being a stickler to the rule of law but also for having a political relative,” she adds.

Curious person

Cut from the same cloth as former Wundanyi MP Mashengu Mwachofi (her brother and one of the “six bearded sisters”), Ms Mwatela took no prisoners.

Simply put, Ms Mwatela’s unflinching commitment to professionalism and integrity made her a thorn in the flesh of unscrupulous government operatives whom she exposed their dirty dealings.

“I was never anti-government. I was just a curious person and it is through that curiosity that I started to unearth a lot of things.”

While serving at the Exchange Control department, she unearthed how unscrupulous CBK staff were colluding with registered exporters to siphon public funds.

Unusual remittances with no items being delivered. No declarations done or custom declaration forms for funds raised. Exaggerated invoices. Flights every day of the week. To beat the system, Exchange Bank was created.

“There were no documents showing export took place and it was a particular airline, Swiss Air Flight 285, that used to handle the business. Something was not adding up yet my director would ignore my alerts,” she recalls.

“It went on and on and I never saw the items that were being exchanged. At the end of the day, I was vindicated. The Goldenberg scandal was the result.”

This is the point that she came face-to-face with Mr Pattni, then a 27-year-old. Kenya was importing and exporting gold but Ms Mwatela never saw the gold. She went through a series of intimidation for refusing to play along.

“Mr Pattni was being received like a king at CBK. There would be an escort taking him to different offices. He would come to my office unannounced...”

Frustrated, Mr Pattni began intimidating her by dropping names of high-ranking government officials like former spymaster the late James Kanyotu and even name-dropping President Daniel arap Moi when she refused to dance to his tunes.

In a recent interview to mark CBK’s 60 years’ anniversary, former CBK Governor Micah Cheserem admitted that export exchange control was an issue at the regulator.

“It (export exchange) was a conduit for corruption. Initially, it was a good idea but anytime there was intervention, there would be a lot of rent-seeking or corruption.”

He recalled Mr Pattni being paid Sh5.8 billion as export compensation in what came to be known as the Goldenberg scandal and, in total, the businessman was owing the bank Sh10 billion.

There was also the discovery of a Sh1.2 billion overnight lending to Mr Pattni’s bank, Exchange Bank.

“We took possession of the Grand Regency as part of the payment, the Exchange Bank and a few other assets,” says Mr Cheserem.

To understand the shark-infested waters Ms Mwatela was swimming in, Mr Cheserem said that Kenya’s economy was on fire, teetering on the brink of economic collapse and the CBK was on auto-pilot.

Public trust in the CBK was at an all-time low with exchange control a source of big problems, banks were controlling public deposits, high inflation and volatile exchange rates coupled with low foreign reserve.

“When I arrived, it was not the CBK I had known. Things were truly bad. The donors had shut their funding,” recalls Mr Cheserem.

After the failed threats, she thought the matter died there but she was wrong. Ms Mwatela was moved to a new department (foreign trade department) and assigned a small office as a demotion for standing her ground by refusing to sign a document that had come from outside.

At the small office, Ms Mwatela again unearthed irregularities in remittances where interbank funds were being amended into export proceeds, which means that whatever was coming into the country were not export proceeds but funds for different things. Alterations would be made in the documents to make them seem so.

“At one point, Mr (Micah) Cheserem was mad at me. He actually gave me six hours to move from the office I was in and transferred me to a department I had never worked in. I was moved to bank supervision.”

Bank Supervision – concerned with physical inspection of commercial banks – was based at KenCom and it was known among the staff as Siberia. Her superiors were instructed not to assign any work but they refused.

But the transfer had its silver lining. During a work assignment, she chanced upon a file which unearthed another scandal.

“Some five commercial banks had been appointed as agents to collect custom duty on behalf of the government but were converting the money to buy Treasury bills. So effectively the government was borrowing its own money,” she says.

She was hurriedly recalled to the Central Bank by Mr Cheserem and transferred to the Estates department to work as Supplies and Services director before being parachuted to lead the Deposits Protection Unit, a unit dealing with foreign institutions by ensuring foreign depositors are well protected.

At the unit, Ms Mwatela unearthed the Charterhouse Bank scandal in 2006 where the bank was accused of being a massive conduit for tax evasion and money laundering estimated to be about $2 billion.

“I found out it (Charterhouse Bank) was not actually a bank but a money laundering entity used by many money launderers. When depositors passed on and next of kin didn’t know about the deposits, they used to steal the deposits,” says Ms Mwatela.

Charterhouse Bank closure

Strictly speaking, money laundering was not a crime in Kenya at the time. But Charterhouse Bank became one of the key reasons for enactment of the Proceeds of Crime and Anti-Money Laundering Act, which came into force in 2010.

Charterhouse Bank was shut down for improper lending practices, filing inaccurate returns with the CBK, failure to document some customers opening accounts, and several other infractions which Ms Mwatela helped unearth.

While serving as deputy governor of the CBK, Ms Mwatela’s move to close Charterhouse Bank was opposed by then Finance minister Amos Kimunya, she recalls.

“It took me two days to get his signature. By the time he was signing it, it was well past 10pm yet I was in his office before 4pm.”

The matter went to Parliament where she was pressured to rescind the decision but she refused.

We reached out to Mr Kimunya over Ms Mwatela’s claims, but he said he will rebut after the story is out.

Then came the Grand Regency Hotel scandal in June 2008 during the tenure of Prof Njuguna Ndung’u. Ms Mwatela reveals that the hotel was collateral for a Sh2.9 billion loan that Mr Pattni’s Exchange Bank had borrowed from CBK.

She narrates how the hotel was being sold and Mr Pattni was on the discussion table and not CBK yet it was a collateral for the CBK loan.

“I was told to agree to what they have discussed but I told them to record my dissenting voice. I insisted the hotel should be sold properly with CBK well represented. But it went on and Justice (Abdul Majid) Cockar report vindicated me.”

Refusing to award a French firm associated with the infamous Artur brothers a currency printing tender, however, is what cooked Ms Mwatela’s goose. She was the tender committee chair.

She explains that the Narc government wanted to change the handling of currency printing in the country, which had become a monopoly.

Further, De La Rue-Kenya was using obsolete equipment at a time the State was looking at a currency that could gain international respect.

Five international firms bid for the contract. One of the rules was that the designs were to be submitted without markings that could identify a firm to rule out bias.

De La Rue International had the best design, while the French firm associated with the Arturs was disqualified for illegal marking.

The French firm unsuccessfully tried to use political weight to lift the disqualification.

Kakamega Senator Boni Khalwale, the-then chairperson of National Assembly Public Accounts Committee (PAC), remembers how Treasury mandarins wanted to use an interim order to avoid a long procurement process and print the currency at inflated price whereas the best value for money for the country was the printing to be done through an international company which was competitive and cheaper.

“The people wanted to steal around Sh3 billion at the time through the new currency printing deal and this is what she fought. This is what she fought and found an ally in PAC as I had proven myself when I removed Kimunya. I gave her my word that I will steer the issue and she applied to be heard in camera,” Dr Khalwale tells Nation.

“Jacinta was truly one in a million. She was operating in an ecosystem where she lacked allies because of standing firm on issues of integrity.”

Senator Khalwale described how former MP Johnstone Muthama – then government chief whip, told him “hii kitu ni moto, will you manage?”

“He (Muthama) told me they want to give you money. They will get to you this weekend. He (Muthama) told me to run away from Nairobi,” he recalls.

In September 2008, eight months before her tenure as CBK deputy governor ended, Ms Mwatela was appointed Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Northern Kenya Development and Arid Areas.

“I knew I was being pushed out for whatever reasons but I was not going to be a cry baby. I wanted to insist things are done in the proper manner,” she avers.

Ms Mwatela proceeded on leave and declined the PS appointment, marking a dramatic end to her civil service tenure.

She tried her hands in politics in the 2013 General Election but lost narrowly to John Mruttu in the Taita Taveta gubernatorial race. Another attempt in 2017 fell flat.

“I may have many, many problems but in my spirit, I am free,” says Ms Mwatela as we end the interview.

Reporting originally appeared via Nation Africa. Read the full source for additional context.