The National Assembly Departmental Committee on Finance and National Planning chaired by Hon. Kuria Kimani (Molo) has resolved to invoke Article 125 of the Constitution to summon a firm contracted by the Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA) to provide excise stamps for excisable goods in Kenya for failure to hour Committee invites.

The firm, SICPA Security Solutions, which has been running several contracts with the Authority, came under the Committee’s scrutiny as Members were reviewing the performance of the Implementation of the Excise Duty (Excisable Goods Management) (Amendment) Regulations, 2023.

The Committee had invited officials of SICPA Security Solutions to appear before it to shed light on a number of issues concerning their engagement with KRA including: the number of Excise stamps supplied to date, the effect of the undersupply on the contract cost and revenue collection and how the firm costs the Excise stamps. The officials, however, did not show up for the meeting. 

In response to the invitation, the Chief Commercial Officer, Mr. Gianni Santoro said the invitation letter had erroneously been directed to the wrong address. He however, indicated that as a law-abiding entity, SICPA SA, its Directors and Officers are committee and willing to cooperate with the National Assembly.

“I Gianni Santoro, confirm my availability as the Chief Commercial Officer to appear before the Committee as directed though on account of previously confirmed engagements and the short notice given, the earliest would be available is the second half of September 2023”, read part of his response.

 Hon. Kuria led Members in castigating the firm for failure to show up, for the second time running. He read a riot act to the management and cautioned that the Committee would demand for the arrest of its officials, should they fail to honour the summons.

“It is unfortunate that SICPA SA failed to honour our invitation. This Committee is keen to investigate the gaps and inefficiencies of concern, key among them, the cost of stamps, management of the contract and the implementation of the system. We shall therefore invoke Article 125 to enforce the attendance of witnesses”, he noted.