Auditor General Edward Ouko has revealed massive plundering of public funds at the county assemblies.
The 2016-17 audit report shows how MCAs and assembly staff have been pocketing millions in illegal mileage, sitting and travel allowances.
Some MCAs, the report reveals, earn irregular allowances without attending plenary or committee sessions, while those on foreign trips do not provide required documents to justify their travel.
Ouko has also identified systemic weaknesses at county assemblies that provide loopholes for huge sums to be siphoned from public coffers.
Weaknesses include poor record-keeping for imprests and other allowances, failure to process payments through the Ifmis computer system and lack of a proper mechanism to monitor MCAs attendance.
Four frontier county assemblies could not account for a total of Sh1 billion in the last financial year.
The Isiolo assembly could not explain expenditures amounting to Sh570 million, Garissa could not account for Sh215 million, Marsabit had unexplained spending of Sh166 million and Mandera couldn’t explain Sh61 million.
The Garissa County Assembly could not provide an accurate and complete account of all the pending bills, raising concerns that funds could have been stolen.
In Marsabit, the assembly has not explained travel and subsistence expenditures valued at Sh90.9 million. The audit shows MCAs got irregular allowances for trips they were not invited to take, or which had no value.
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The assembly is faced with Sh10.9 million unsupported medical insurance cover spending, Sh20million questionable vouchers, local purchase orders and invoices of pending bills.
Mandera had Sh20 million unaccounted for ward fund expenses, Sh6 million unsupported training expenses, Sh23 million MCAs’ mileage claims that couldn’t be documented and Sh9 million in unaccounted for travel and subsistence allowances.
The latest audit report reveals massive irregular expenditures at the Narok County Assembly where MCAs illegally pocketed Sh64,228,648 in mileage allowances.
According to Ouko’s report, MCAs were entitled to a maximum of Sh14,230,080 for the year as prescribed by the SRC, not the Sh78,458,725 they were paid as mileage allowances.
“Therefore, the excess Sh64,228,648 mileage allowance was irregularly paid. The county assembly was therefore in breach of the law,” Ouko concludes.
The assembly also far exceeded the mileage allowance budget by Sh21,969,099 over and above the Sh56,489,626 budgeted for in the financial year.
MCAs could be surcharged for the money they pocketed illegally. Ouko said lawmakers were also paid extra sitting allowances of Sh2,697,780 through fictitious committee and plenary attendance registers.
The county was also flagged for Sh23,739,601 spent on domestic and subsistence costs without proper documentation, as well as Sh12,224,746 charged on foreign travel, whose propriety could not be confirmed.
Ouko also questioned Sh17.7 million paid to Nyeri MCAs and assembly staff allegedly for workshops, seminars and retreats.
The assembly failed to provide supporting documents to confirm the veracity of massive expenditures incurred for meetings outside the assembly.
Further, the assembly did not produce invitation letters, programmes of the seminars or reports generated during the meetings to convince auditors that the meetings actually took place.
“Further, the meetings would have been economically and conveniently conducted within the assembly’s offices designated for such meetings,” Ouko concluded.
He said while financial statements indicated that Sh26,771,534 was spent on training expenses, records maintained by the county assembly indicated Sh27,192,334, leaving an unexplained and reconciled difference of Sh420,800.
The auditor also flagged the county for breaching the one-third rule on staff recruitment, with 92 per cent of the assembly staff being from one dominant community.
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In the Nakuru county assembly, Ouko questioned 1.4 million for sale of motor vehicles and a further Sh3.2 million county assembly car and mortgage fund.
Ouko said the assembly failed to prepare and submit 2016-17 financial statements for the mortgage and car loan fund as required in the PFM act.
“A report containing information on the financial and non-financial performance of the fund was also not produced for audit,” Ouko observed.
He also unearthed a mega scam in MCAs’ sitting allowance claims. He said lawmakers were pocketing money without actually attending committee sittings.
Ouko observed that the biometric system installed to record attendance showed that some MCAs were clocking in and walking out immediately, while others who did not attend were recorded manually as having been present.
“The use of the biometric system as a control tool while attending meetings is not being enforced and leads to payment of sitting allowances for meetings not attended,” the report said.
The Auditor General also questioned the Sh6 million contract to supply and deliver seats and desks from the Prisons department through single-sourcing.
While the assembly engaged the Prisons department to supply 78 office desks, single speaker’s seats and 50 public gallery seats, the audit revealed that of the items ordered only 58 desks were delivered.
“Furthermore there is no clause in the contract agreement that binds the supplier for failure to deliver or for delayed deliveries,” Ouko said.
The assembly also irregularly issued two separate LPOs — number 212 dated August 31, 2017, for Sh3,575,000 and number 1027 dated April 13, 2017, for Sh6,000,000 — for supply of the same items without adequate explanation or even cancelling one.
In Kirinyaga county, the Auditor General questioned why Sh2 million transferred from the county treasury to the assembly was not captured in records.
He queried Sh2,320,000 spent on produced assets, which was not captured in Ifmis, contrary to the law
Ouko also put the county assembly on the spot for spending without adequate budget, resulting in unpaid bills amounting to Sh3,588,454.
It was improper for the assembly to enter into financial commitments for which no resources were available.
The Murang’a county assembly failed to satisfy auditors about why it paid Sh55,179,694 for daily subsistence allowance for meetings held outside the assembly.
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“The management has not, however, provided convincing reason why such meetings could not be held within the county assembly premises to save on unnecessary domestic travel and related hire of facilities outside the assembly,” Ouko observed.
Further, payment of Sh1,961,600 was not adequately supported by documentation such as invitation letters, motor vehicle works tickets, attendance registers and reports of meetings held.
At the same time Ouko flagged Sh4.7 million subscription fees to the County Assemblies Forum and the Society of Clerks, saying they were illegal as such commitments lacked supporting policy guidelines by the assembly.
In the Bomet assembly, Ouko queried why the management refused to process bank reconciliations through Ifmis as required by law, resulting in unexplained expenditures.
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For instance, bank reconciliations were prepared outside Ifmis for all bank accounts it operates, despite Ifmis being the required method of payment.
The assembly was also on the spot for more than Sh90,957,699 paid to assembly staff for domestic travel and substance without supporting documents.
“It was observed that officers traveling on official duty were not issued with safari imprest as required but were instead allowed to travel and make claims upon return. It was therefore difficult to confirm whether actual travel took place,” the auditor said.
Ouko also questioned Sh29 million incurred by the county assembly on foreign travel, against a budget of Sh10.3 million.
Cash safari imprests amounting to Sh22 million were issued to officers travelling abroad without proper records. a further Sh14,701,028 was paid out to companies and individuals in relation to foreign travel without supporting documents, making it difficult to authenticate authorisation.