The Nairobi County Assembly has raised queries over Sh297.5 million bursary funds that were allegedly used to pay garbage collection contractors and lawyers.
This comes as the National Government intends to reopen the schools from October which were closed for seven months following the outbreak of Coronavirus Pandemic in Kenya.
Wading into the issue, Deputy Minority Whip Moses Ogeto via a statement has thrown the ball to the Sectoral Committee on Children, Early Childhood Education and Vocational Training regarding the usage of bursary funds for the Financial Year 2019-2020.
“It has been alleged that Sh297,500,000 was requested by the County Secretary from the Controller of Budget and they have been given this money which is meant for bursaries but has been channelled to pay contractors for garbage collection, lawyers and others,” he said.
“I have raised this concern because the schools are reopening in the next few days.”
The Committee on Education is required to provide the status report on the disbursement of bursary vouchers for the Financial Year 2019-2020.
The committee is also expected to report on steps being taken by the County Executive to ensure that the budgetary allocation for the financial year 2029-2020 was efficiently utilised since the government intend to reopen the schools from October 2020.
“That is a critical statement and as an assembly, we know that our children are about to go back to school. I want to get a good response on this,” said Immapet Kemunto, the assembly's temporary Deputy Speaker.
On behalf of the Education Chairperson, Deputy Majority Whip Waithera Chege stated the response will be given this week.
In this Financial year 2020-2021, a sum of Sh1.49 billion has been placed under the Education Sector, where Sh64 million will go towards the free public ECDE grant.
To meet the governor’s bursary scholarship Sh107 million has been proposed in this Financial Year.
Bursary scandals are not new at City Hall as MCAs and the Executive have been at loggerheads over the issue.
In May 2018, MCAs and beneficiaries complained about the big number of dishonoured cheques due to conflicting signatures and name mismatches.
In June 2018, it was revealed that Sh297.5 million worth of bursary funds were erroneously sent to a bank account belonging to the University of Maryland, Australia baffling the MCAs.
Explaining the issue, the executive said that accountants erroneously picked the health donor fund account instead of the bursary account.
In April 2019, Nairobi Governor Mike Sonko launched the electronic transfer of bursary funds directly to schools to curb corruption.
There were claims that some county officials and legislators banked the cheques in their companies or proxy accounts leading to loss of millions of shillings meant for students.
Despite the electronic launch, there was a delay to disburse Sh400 million to needy students.
The bursary was to benefit over 4,000 needy students across the 85 wards but was faced with various challenges leading to delay of funds being released to various school accounts.
