Managers of Chinese state-owned enterprise building US$3.8b African railway fined for bribery

Two managers of a Chinese state-owned enterprise building a railway in East Africa have been fined after admitting bribery in a court in Kenya.

Liu Yabin, a senior official at the China Road and Bridge Corporation, and his colleague, Tang Ju, who is a liaison officer, both pleaded guilty last month to offering and paying bribes to Kenyan highway representatives, a spokeswoman for Kenya’s Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission said on Thursday.

The men were arrested after offering bribes to highway officials on September 4 and 5 in an attempt to have penalties waived after being stopped for overloading their trucks with construction materials.

Liu had been accused of offering a bribe of 30,000 Kenyan Shillings (HK$2,200) and Tang of offering a bribe of KS100,000.

Both Tang and Liu had now been freed after paying a court fine of KS380,000, the commission spokeswoman said.

The court had ordered Tang to serve 20 months in prison and Liu six months in jail if they failed to pay the fines.