Listen to This Article Enhance your reading experience by listening to this article.

A Senate oversight committee has put the leadership of the Tana River County Assembly on the spot for failing to conduct due diligence in awarding a tender for the construction of the speaker’s residence.

The Senate County Public Accounts committee chaired by Homa Bay lawmaker Moses Kajwang’ established that the assembly awarded the Sh28 million tender to an incompetent firm that later abandoned the project mid-way, putting at risk millions of taxpayers’ money.

Assembly speaker Osman Galole and clerk Abdullah Dayib had a rough time responding to audit reports by Auditor General Nancy Gathungu for the 2019-20 and 2020-21 financial years.

The audit report revealed that the assembly leadership entered into the Sh28.08 million contract with a firm for the construction of the residence and that during the 2020-21 fiscal year, the Assembly incurred Sh5.18 million on the project.

However, the project, which was supposed to be completed in February 2021, has stalled after the contractor abandoned the site.

“Physical verification conducted on November 12, 2021 revealed that the works at the site had stalled at the substructure level as the contractor was not on site at the time of the inspection, nine months past the expected completion,” the report reads in part.

Galole and Dayib told the Moses Kajwang-led committee that the contractor abandoned the project soon after completing excavation works. “This particular conduct was the lowest bidder. His figure was below Sh30million that is why we awarded him the contract,” said Dayib.

He went on: “After four months, he ran out of the site and wrote to us saying he could not continue with the work under the same terms. He asked us to revise the contract saying the amount was small.”

He said that after push and pull and exchange of letters, they mutually agreed to terminate the contract.

“The contractor moved from the site and the County Assembly is in the process of re-advertising for works of the Speaker’s residence,” he said, adding that the advert has already been put out.

However, while acknowledging that the Assembly budget and contract for the construction of the speaker’s residence were within the required limit, the senators faulted the assembly for failing to do due diligence to ascertain the capacity of the contractor.

The ceiling set by the senate and the commission for revenue allocation provides that the county assembly shall not spend more than Sh35 million on the construction of the speaker’s residence.
Senator Fatuma Dullo (Isiolo) said the assembly exposed taxpayers’ money to risk of loss due to failure to scrutinise the ability of the contractor.

“Already Sh5 million has been paid to the contractor. You are bringing a new contractor who is going to do the same work. It’s simply wastage of public money,” she said.

“What this means is that the speaker and the clerk did not do due diligence in awarding the contract. You must look at the capacity, history and ability of the contractor,” Nandi Senator Samson Cherargei said.
Meanwhile, the committee faulted the county assembly for irregular payment of Sh5million every year to the County Assemblies Forum.

The Forum, which brings together speakers and MCAs from the 47 devolved units, relies on the contribution of the assemblies to run its affairs.

However, the committee noted that the Forum is not established by any law, and as such ay contributions to it are illegal.

“It’s the position of this committee that payments to the county assemblies’ forum is illegal and must end, and those responsible for previous payments must be surcharged,” Kajwang said.