Kenyatta pledges to address Pandora Papers scandal

Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta has vowed to ‘respond comprehensively’ to reports that his family secretly owned a network of offshore companies for decades. This is among the latest findings from a far-reaching new investigation by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists media consortium. The so-called ‘Pandora Papers’ investigation – involving about 600 journalists from media including The Washington Post, the BBC and The Guardian – is based on the leak of some 11.9m documents from 14 financial services companies around the world. Kenyatta and six members of his family have been linked to 13 offshore companies. The Kenyattas' offshore investments, including a company with stocks and bonds worth $30m, were discovered among hundreds of thousands of pages of administrative paperwork from the archives of 14 law firms and service providers in Panama and the British Virgin Islands as well as other tax havens. Kenyatta told CNN the reports ‘will go a long way in enhancing the financial transparency and openness that we require in Kenya and around the globe’. ‘The movement of illicit funds, proceeds of crime and corruption thrive in an environment of secrecy and darkness,’ he said. He added that the Pandora Papers and subsequent follow up audits will lift that veil of secrecy and darkness for those who cannot explain their assets or wealth’.