“The Kiambu County and the other counties did not budget, receive or spend the monies as indicated in the financial report,” a statement issued after the meeting indicated/FILE
NAIROBI, Kenya, May 7 – A meeting between the Council of Governors, Controller of Budget and officials from the Auditor General’s office has concluded that Kiambu and several other counties did not budget, receive or spend monies indicated in audit reports that were questioned by a Senate committee.
A consultative meeting between the three institutions observed that the counties in question did not have the budget items which included State House functions, South Sudan Peace process and retired Presidents.
“The Kiambu County and the other counties did not budget, receive or spend the monies as indicated in the financial report,” a statement issued after the meeting indicated.
The statement by the CoG, Controller of Budget and Auditor General’s office says they resolved to form a multi-stakeholder technical committee who should conduct an investigation and submit a report in 14 days.
It will be chaired by the Controller of Budget and comprise the CoG, Treasury and Auditor General.
The Senate Public Accounts and Investments Committee has in the meantime been asked to suspend appearance by governors over the 2017/18 audit queries.
Oparanya’s own County of Kakamega, Kitui, Garissa, Kirinyaga, Kwale, Lamu, Nyamira, and Samburu are among the counties which had financial reports indicating the allocations.
The Senate CPAIC on Thursday last week directed the Auditor General to conduct a special audit for the 2017/2018 financial year in Kiambu County and submit a report within 45 days.
Committee Chairperson Senator Moses Kajwang’ (Homabay) made the ruling after Governor Ferdinand Waititu said he was not aware of such accounts and promised that investigation will be done.
Waititu who had a difficult time defending his county said accounts and figures might have been doctored by his political opponents who are malicious and want to paint him as a corrupt governor vowing not to take responsibility for the “misleading” budget lines.
“I do not know where those figures and accounts came from and you all know it is not possible for counties to finance any State House function because we do not have budgets for that. This is something that has been done without my knowledge just to make my administration look bad,” stated Waititu.
Chief of Staff Nzioka Waita later issued a Twitter statement distancing State House from the claims.
“Just for the record: State House does not share any budgets with the County Government of Kiambu,” Nzioka tweeted.
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