Kiraitu, Imanyara clash over MoU with Libya investors

Energy Minister Kiraitu Murungi and Imenti Central MP Gitobu Imanyara clashed over a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed between Kenyan and Libyan officials in June 2007, ceding control of key oil investments to the Tripoli regime.Mr Imanyara tabled the MoU at a sitting of Parliament’s Energy Committee, which is investigating escalating fuel prices at a time most Kenyan politicians are trying to distance themselves from the besieged Libyan despot.
Kiraitu accused Imanyara of introducing what he considered an irrelevant document in the meeting.
The minister told Imanyara to "shut up" when the Imenti Central MP introduced the document and suggested that the minister and his entourage signed the document in a conspiracy to raise billions of shillings from Libya for the 2012 General Election.
Enraged the Imenti Central MP stormed out of the meeting at County Hall in Nairobi.
On June 5, in in Libya, Murungi and Information PS Bitange Ndemo signed the MoU in which Libya pledged to supply 40 per cent of Kenya’s petroleum demand in exchange of substantial stake for the Libya Africa Investment Portfolio (LAP) in the Kenya Petroleum Refineries Ltd.
Former grand regencyIn the MoU signed on Libya’s behalf by LAP chairman, Bashir Saleh Bashir, Kenya promised to sell the former Grand Regency to the Libyans. Kenya also pledged to allow LAP acquire a stake in Telkom’s ICT projects and also in the East African Marine System fibre optic cable between Mombasa and Fujaira in the United Arab Emirates at $100 million.
Imanyara claimed the Grand Regency (now Laico Hotel) was part of a deal to raise funds for 2007 General Election. He also claimed that Vice-President Kalonzo Musyoka’s shuttle diplomacy trip to Libya was a mission of pursuing money from the country and was not a genuine journey to lobby support for deferral of International Criminal Court cases.
Local Government Assistant Minister Lewis Nguyai, however, dismissed the allegations as extremely frivolous.
—Reporting by Martin Mutua and David Ochami