To understand how the war on corruption can be won, Kenyans only need to walk to the dusty history books shelf and read about the plight of David Sadera Munyakei, an unsung hero who was led to his death by his act of valour and patriotism.
In a country where the words cartels and the war on graft have come to be interpreted to mean ‘invisible people’ and ‘an insurmountable task’, Munyakei’s story is a tale of a man who took the bull by the horns to save the country from unprecedented plunder.
David Sadera Munyakei was the whistleblower of the infamous Goldenberg Scandal that rocked the country during former President Daniel Moi’s tenure where billions of public funds were being lost in a fictitious scheme couched as a gold and diamonds export venture.
Billionaire businessman and former spy honcho James Kanyotu had hatched the scheme and formed Goldenberg International, a special purpose company to conduct their ‘business’.
The government was supposed to subsidize the exports to help them compete on the international front.
At the time, Munyakei, 23, was working as a clerk at the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) tasked with authorizing transactions when he noticed that the enterprise was a scam.
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Of keen interest to Munyakei was the huge amounts of money being paid to the exporters and that the fact that Kenya is not known to have any viable gold mines.
CBK continued to pay the exporters huge sums amounting to Ksh60 billion, a fifth of the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) at the time which prompted Munyakei to approach two opposition MPs with hard evidence of the scam in 1993.
And as it would be expected, the legislators tabled the report in parliament which drew fireworks and quickly gripped the attention of the country but sadly, that would also become the genesis of Munyakei’s problems.
Despite casting aside his fears to save the economy which had been brought to its knees, Munyakei was arrested and charged under the Official Secrets Act.
He was later released only to find out that he had been sacked by CBK, what’s more he had become an enemy of the deep state and was a walking target.
Alive of his predicament, he fled to Mombasa where he laid low up until when he appeared before the Goldenberg Commission of Inquiry in 2003 to testify to what he had witnessed clinging on the hope that justice would finally be served.
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“After 1992 elections this thing became very rampant and became open theft,” Munyakei told the commission.
Munyakei was never recognized for his patriotism as the inquiry dragged on without any heads rolling. Without many options, he went back into hiding.
He died in Narok in 2006 due to lack of access to medicine that he desperately needed at the time.
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