The Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission is investigating the alleged transfer of Sh18 million from Vihiga county government account.
This money is alleged to have been transferred to a bank with a branch in Mbale by two top county officers in collaboration with their counterparts. According to a source in the county, this was done upon concerns that the money could end up returned to the Central Bank in the financial year 2017/18 as is required by law for funds that have not been utilised.
In a letter seen by the Star, the commission has invited 10 MCAs from the county to record statements.
“To facilitate our investigations, we kindly request you to facilitate the officers to appear for an interview and statement recordings to our western regional office in Kisumu,” reads the letter sent to the county assembly clerk and dated November 8, 2018.
The funds were allegedly deposited by Sports CEC Marita Agufana and Finance CEC Alfred Indeche who were impeached last week.
Agufana said she transferred the money to a private account to keep it safe from the national Treasury upon expiry 2017-2018 financial year.
Early this year, Vihiga governor Wilber Ottichilo suffered a major setback after the county assembly voted to impeach two executives over alleged misappropriation of public funds. The assembly also voted to suspend two chief officers to allow for the formation of a committee to investigate them.
The MCAs had earlier written to the bank to get more details of the said account. When contacted, the EACC western Kenya region manager Ignatius Wekesa confirmed that indeed they were investigating the matter.
The county government has in the past couple of weeks reshuffled some of its officers in what was termed as an effort to improve service delivery.
Governor Ottichilo said he hoped the MCAs would work peacefully with the executive because the wars between the county assembly and the executive had hurt his administration.
EACC is also investigating procurement matters in relation to Sh200 million for construction of a 1.8km road within Mbale town by the county government in financial year 2016-17.
The funds were allocated for sports activities in July. Yesterday, journalists were thrown out of a meeting the ad hoc committee convened to discuss the issue.
