Weekly Citizen 20th-26th February 2006

In the history of presidential power brokers in Kenya, no one has ever
occupied the position of power currently enjoyed by Stanley Murage, the
State House-based PS for Strategic Policy Analysis. Murage and new
Finance Minister Amos Kimunya are the second and third most powerful men of the final stretch of the Kibaki presidency. And given the fact that
Kimunya was a popular chairman of the prestigious Muthaiga Golf Club the
year President Kibaki, patron of the Kenya Golf Union and a member of
the Muthaiga Golf Club, entered the State House, and also the fact that
Murage is a very wealthy man, the new power elite around the presidency
is being referred to as the Muthaiga Mafia. Murage's position is unique
because no power-broker of his impact and ambition has cultivated his
position within State House itself. Kenya's premier to power brokers
have always been based outside State House in the cabinet, parliament or
civil service.

The Kenyatta era had Mbiyu Koinange, Dr. Njoroge Mungai and Charles
Njonjo. The Moi era had Njonjo, G.G. Kariuki, Simeon Nyachae, Nicholas Biwott and Mark Too. The Kibaki passing-cloud era has had Dr. Chris Ndarathi Murungaru, David Mwiraria and Kiraitu Murungi before Murage made his masterstroke move and felled all of them in a three month
period, beginning with Murungaru's omission from the cabinet in December
2005. There have been State House-based powerbrokers but their
operations have been behind-the- scenes to avoid overshadowing the
president of members of the First Family. The first was the late Eliud
Mathu in the Kenyatta era. Alfred Mwangi Getonga, who until last week
was President Kibaki's PA and Joshua Kulei of the Moi era was the last
strong link of the Mt. Kenya Mafia to be broken by Murage. With Getonga
gone, it is only a matter of time now before head of civil service and
secretary to the cabinet Francis Muthaura also throws in the towel and
Kenya Anti-Corruption boss Aaron Ringera is hounded out of his tenured
office.

Stanley K. Murage's triumph has been complete. His role in the destruction of the Mt. Kenya Mafia was pivotal. If it was not for Murage, self-exiled former State House-based PS for Ethics and Governance John Githongo would not have been able to release his devastating with as much impact both locally and internationally as he has. It was Murage who quietly informed Githongo late last year that his dossiers addressed to President Kibaki on the subject of the Anglo- Leasing scams had disappeared from the President's office and living quarters at State House, Nairobi.

According to impeccable sources, First Lady Lucy Kibaki, who has a major stake in Equatorial Bank, which is adversely mentioned in Githongo's
dossier, Alfred Getong and three of the president's children plotted the
disappearance of copies of the Githongo dossier of November 25, 2005
from the president's office and living quarters during the Christmas break. Murage, who was posted to State House in October 2004, noticed that copies of Githongo's dossier in the president's office at State House were missing and so he asked a number of State House staffers whose hiring he influenced and who answer only to him to trace copies of the same that the president had taken with him into his living quarters just before Christmas. Murage's informers, who include State House cleaners, valets and kitchen staff reported to him the alarming news that the documents were nowhere to be found, not even in the refuse baskets from the president's living quarters. Murage promptly informed Githongo about the development.

Sometime in late December and full consultation with the president's old
friend Joe Wanjui, Njenga Karume, Father (rtd) George Muhoho, Nat
Kangethe, Prof. Nick Wanjohi, and Solicitor General Wanjuki Muchemi,
Murage told Githongo to go ahead and release the Anglo- Leasing scams
dossier(s) as he had threatened to do. The expose knocked out Mwiraria.
But not even Kenyans and leaders anticipated that the BBC World Service
would take up the story and broadcast it to a global audience, thereby
knocking out Murungaru, George Saitoti, Kiraitu, Getonga and (coming
soon) Awori and Muthaura. But the seeds of Murage's downfall are already present in his greatest moment of triumph. He will be forever remembered as Githongo's point man inside State House who helped to fell the Mt. Kenya Mafia. Who is this man Murage and has he outmanoeuvred Kibaki's own most loyal lieutenants from within the citadel of their own power?

Murage hails from Kirinyaga where he was born on 18th of May 1950. A
quantity surveyor, he served President Daniel arap Moi as a trusted
permanent secretary for six years ( 1994-2000). During the same period
he was an influential member of the boar of directors of Kenya Times
Ltd, the then ruling party KANU's media organ, a job secured for him on
the intervention of three key pillars of the Moi regime: KANU Secretary
General John Joseph Kamotho; the then Managing Director of the Kenya
Power and Lighting Company Sam Gichuru and the then Chairman of the
Cooperative Bank of Kenya Hosea Kiplagat, Moi's favourite nephew. Today Murage, from his powerful perch at State House, has reduced all three men to his errand boys. Kamotho is the powerful Murage's pointman in the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) Gichuru provides Murage with tens of millions of shillings of allegedly "clean money" for "political work" in
exchange for a continuing slowdown of his corruption-related cases and
Kiplagat runs errands between Moi's Kabarnet Gardens and Kabarak command posts.

Murage has accumulated his immense powers inside Kibaki's troubled State House by completely out-manoeuvering everybody that the president held dear to his hold on power. He has even isolated First Lady Lucy from the seat of power by ensuring that she is no longer allowed to the visit the
place at night. He has destroyed Alfred Getonga and his network. And now
the president is alone at State House with Stanley Murage and people
vetted by the same Stanley Murage.

What is Murage's agenda?And what are his links to two other powerful
Kirinyaga personalities: Matere Kereri and former Director of Intelligence James Kanyotu?

As we went to press unconfirmed reports were emerging that a top
anti-corruption judicial official who received a Sh. 5 million bribe in
cash in the lobby of Nairobi's Serena Hotel from one of Murage's strange
alliance. And then there is the mystery of what exactly Murage does and
what his changing designation means. In a conversation with Weekly
Citizen on Thursday last week, Murage insisted that his correct
designation was Advisor to the President, Strategic Policy. But when he
was appointed in October 2004, his designation was given as PS for
Strategic Policy Analysis. Even the State House website has been changed
to reflect this change. But no official announcement of a change in
focus in Murage's designation has ever been officially given.

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