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The anti-corruption court has ordered the police to arrest the Vihiga county quantity surveyor Eugene Wandera Wamalwa and arraign him over the Sh17 million theft from the Vihiga county government.

Kakamega anti-corruption and economic crimes court magistrate Joseph Ndururi ordered Wamalwa arrested after he failed to show up in court to take plea along his co-accused in the Sh17 fraud case.

Wamalwa was charged in absentia alongside seven other public officers including Medical Services chief officer Arnold Mamadi, Director of Procurement Godfrey Oyaro and architect Wesley Ng’ang’a

Others were procurement officers Sande Undisa Mwangi, Laura Naliaka and Dalton Benson Amokua, a consultant Eddy Mirera and two Sava Construction Company Ltd directors Simon Kiama and Anastasia Kaguri.

They face eleven corruption related charges among them conspiracy to defraud, willful failure to comply with procurement laws, abuse of office, uttering false documents and fraudulent acquisition of public property.

The offenses were allegedly committed between February 2018 and December 2019.

They pleaded not guilty to the charges and asked to be released on bond. They were briefly remanded as they waited for a court ruling on their bail application last evening.

Dr Mamadi, Oyaro, Wamalwa, Ng’ang’a, Mwangi, Juma and Naliaka were jointly charged that on February 2019 and 2020 at Vihiga county, they acted contrary to the procurement law during the award of tender NoVCG/HLT/702190/2018/2019 for construction of a blood transfusion centre at Vihiga county hospital to Sava Construction company.