Kenyan president cancels major deal with Adani Group

 Kenyan President William Ruto has cancelled two major deals with controversial Indian tycoon Gautam Adani. The decision comes after US prosecutors charged Mr. Adani with fraud.

The move comes a day after India's second-richest man, Gautam Adani, was charged with planning a $250 million bribe and secretly trying to collect the money in the United States.

Adani

The Adani Group has denied the allegations by US prosecutors as "baseless".

"If there is solid evidence or credible information about corruption, I will not hesitate to take strong action," Mr. Ruto said in his speech, drawing cheers from the parliament.

The Adani Group planned to invest $1.85 billion in Kenya's main airport. The agreement was that they would operate it for 30 years. In addition, there was a $736 million deal with the Ministry of Energy to build a power line.

Why is the Adani Group in this situation?

In January last year, Adani lost about $25 billion of his personal wealth in a single week.At that time, after a controversial report by New York-based firm Hindenburg Research was published, the share prices of various companies owned by Gautam Adani collapsed.

Investment research firm Hindenburg Research, in its report last year, accused Mr. Adani’s business organization of “the largest fraud in the history of the corporate world.”

This New York-based company is specialized in “short-selling.” In this method, when the share price of a company falls, it takes a financial position in that share to gain a benefit.

The Hindenburg Research report raised questions about the ownership of various companies by the Adani Group in various tax havens such as Mauritius and the Caribbean islands.