Murang'a headcount to weed out ghost workers

@Alicewangechi

The Murang’a government will next week conduct a headcount to weed out ghost workers.

Governor Irungu Kang’ata on Friday said the devolved unit has about 4,000 workers who drive the recurrent expenditure to about Sh4 billion every year, about half of its budget.

But this, he said, is against the law, which requires 65 per cent of revenue to go towards development while recurrent expenditure takes the remaining 35 per cent.

The county has already written to all its subcounty offices indicating when local employees will be counted.

“The county government has constituted a taskforce that will help in identifying gaps in the management of human resource,” the letter read.

“To this extent, the committee will undertake a head count of all county employees on te dates specified.”

Employees from Murang’a East and Kahuro subcounties will be counted at Mothers Union hall and Murang’a County Referral Hospital in Murang’a town on September 27, while Kangema and Mathioya will also be counted on the same day at Kangema Empowerment Hall.

Staffers from Maragua will be counted on September 28 at ACK Rurago hall, Kandara and Kigumo at Kangari ACC and S Church Hall, and Gatanga and Kakuzi at Gatanga Catholic hall on the same day.

Employees will be required to avail all their academic and professional certificates, identity cards, letters of first and current employment, passport size photographs and latest payslips.

“We need to investigate if our payroll has ghost workers so we can weed them out,” the governor said.

Kang’ata has promised to come up with a formula that will ensure county workers’ salaries are paid without delays in a few months and has embarked on digitisation of county systems to seal loopholes used for theft.

Last week, the governor also initiated the verification of the county’s debts amounting to Sh2.7 billion. Contractors owed presented their documents to a committee formed to help sort the debts out.

The governor assured the contractors that those whose documents will be verified will be paid. He, however, said that the Auditor General had written to him indicating that an audit had been done on the county's debts from 2013 to 2019.

The governor said he would only verify debts accrued since 2020. He said those whose debts dated further back but had been verified by the Auditor General will also be paid.

 The process is expected to be completed in a month’s time and a payment plan drawn with the governor indicating that he wants to start his term on a clean slate.

The new administration will have some of the county government’s assets audited to establish their status, with the first in line being the multi-billion Murang’a County Creameries plant in Maragua.