•It also established that the county government had in place a work plan procurement, training plan and approved budget for the county emergency fund financed by its own sources and the Kenya DevolutionSupport Project.
•Besides, there was no approved work plan and budget for the utilization of the health workers allowances received from the national government.
Image: HESBORN ETYANG
Turkana county is on the spot over claims of misusing Covid-19 funds.
A special audit report by Auditor General Nancy Gathungu reveals that Turkana used Sh62.4million out of the Sh187million County emergency fund for non-Covid-19 activities.
It also established that the county government had in place a work plan procurement, training plan and approved budget for the county emergency fund financed by its own sources and the Kenya DevolutionSupport Project.
On the contrary, there was no evidence of the existence of an approved budget procurement plan and training plan for the conditional grants received from the national government.
Besides, there was no approved work plan and budget for the utilization of the health workers allowances received from the national government.
The management explained that the absence of approved budgets, training plans and procurement plans was because funds were received from the national government towards the end of the financial year 2019/2020 after counties had already concluded preparation of the 2020/2021 financial year budgets estimates.
Gathungu reveals that as of July 31 last year, it was established that Sh29,977,000 million had been utilized for Covid-19 related activities out of a total of Sh187, 000,000million allocated for covid-19 purposes.
It’s therefore expected that the balance of Sh157,023,000million was intact.
“However the balance in the account as of July 31 was sh94,763,668million, therefore sh62,259,331million had been utilized for non-Covid-19 related activities contrary to the government regulation,” the report states.
The audit report further reveals, as of October last year, the balance in the account was Sh4,947,787million yet a total expenditure of Sh31,857,000million had been incurred for covid-19 related activities by the date.
Therefore Sh150,195,212million was utilized for non-covid-19 related expenditures as of October last year.
“An amount of Sh480,311,939million was budgeted, allocated and disbursed to the Turkanacounty Covid-19 Emergency Response Fund, which is a fund under the County Own Source of funds.
As of July 31 last year, the full amount was held at the County Covid-19 Emergency fund account number,”
“As at the time of audit October 8 last year, Sh700, 000 had been withdrawn from the account to serve as imprest/petty cash for the Covid-19 board secretariat, after a cash survey at the imprest section, the audit confirmed that the cash was still held intact awaiting the imprest petty cash requests from the board secretariat,” the report states.
It was established that the county produced and submitted to the Controller of Budget financial report on the utilization of Covid-19 funds
The special audit established that while the amount budgeted for the financial year 2019/2020 for the KDSP was Sh30,000,000million as per the printed budget estimates for the financial year 2019/2020, the report by the county government to the controller of Budget reported the budget as Sh45,000,000million
The report reveals that except for County Own Source Revenue, all the funds had not been utilized as of July 31, last year.
An actual expenditure of Sh31,720,410million was incurred under the County Own Resources specifically, under the County Emergency Fund as of July 31, last year.
However, the County reported an actual expenditure of Sh31,857,000million to the Controller of Budget.
It was noted that the total usage as reported by the County was higher by Sh136, 590 as compared to the amount confirmed by the special audit
There was no evidence that the county government-generated non-financial reports for Covid-19 related activities for the period under review
The county received a total of Sh888, 193,939 million for Covid-19 activities.
It received Sh136,322,000 million from the government conditional grant, Sh12,005,000 million from Danida, Sh42,555,000 million for health workers allowances, Sh480,311,939 million County Own Source, Sh187,000,000 for County Emergency fund, and Sh30,000,000 from KDSP.
As of July 31 last year, funds from the National government grant and Danida funds were still held at the Turkana County revenue fund.
This was attributed to the absence of approved budgets, work plan, and procurement plans to facilitate spending.
The Health care allowances had been transferred to the county operational account for use while the funds from the county own source and KDSP had been transferred to the recipient special account.
Edited by Kiilu Damaris