[According to the EACC, IEBC cleared some individuals who had pending cases at the courts to vie for various seats.] (Photo/Standard)
The Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) has accused the IEBC of sabotaging their fight against corruption, after the commission allegedly cleared 106 leaders to contest for the August 8 elections despite having cases.
Speaking in Naivasha on Thursday during the ongoing Senate retreat, EACC vice chairperson, Sophia Lepuchirit said most of the elected MPs had pending cases, and should not have been cleared to run.
“During vetting, we blacklisted 106 aspirants starting from governors to MCAs who had integrity issues and even cases with EACC but they were cleared by IEBC,” said Ms Lepuchirit as quoted by the Standard.
She came to the defense of her commission, which has over time been accused of laxity in prosecuting individuals mentioned in corruption.
The anti-corruption body termed the issue 'very serious', noting that over 60 per cent of the leaders in question had been elected.
“We are doing a lot, we even have a former governor and his 29 officials who are facing charges of abuse of office in court as we speak,” she said.
She added: “We have increased our investigating staff from 350 in 2015 to 700 currently and this will help deal with the high number of complaints we receive that now stands at 61,000, with 21,000 being under various levels of investigation,”