EACC officers descend on Kajiado County for Sh150m imprest probe
By Oliver Musembi, March 25, 2024A contingent of Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) detectives will camp in Kajiado county headquarters for a second week seeking to unravel a trail of financial improprieties.
This week, the sleuths will focus on a suspected imprests heist amounting to more than Sh50 million drawn in 70 transactions in September last year.
According to EACC sources, the officers have taken interest in the imprests where Sh35 million was withdrawn in a single day.
EACC deputy director in charge of forensic investigations George Ojowi wrote to County Secretary Francis Ole Sakuda on March 12 demanding documents related to Imprests received by 50 members of staff and which the EACC suspect was diverted to other uses.
The employees received amounts ranging from Sh800,000 to Sh900,000 further raising suspicions on the uniformity of the amounts.
Ojowi’s letter to the County Government now wants production of budgetary allocations for the current financial years, payment vouchers, imprest warrants, activity memos and imprest surrender documents, among other documents that would justify the expenditure.
“We have given two officers who will be available to receive the documents on March 27, 2024,” says Ojowi’s letter.
Impeachment motion
The new probe puts on the spot the Finance Executive Elias Kisota and Chief Finance Officer Tutui Lekina. Kisota is smarting from an impeachment motion against him brought by an MCA over abuse of office and misuse of public resources at the County Government.
The People Daily has learnt that the documents leading to the EACC probe were leaked from the Department of Finance by some disgruntled officers who were against skewed approval of approvals in favour of some departments at the expense of others.
The EACC wants Kajiado to provide Budget allocations and Procurement Plans for the Financial Years 2023-2024.
Other required documents include all payment vouchers relating to the payments with their attachments, imprest warrants and approved activity memos.
The commission also requested imprest documents and any other relevant documents that would aid in the probe. EACC said its officers W.Jattani and A.Kahiga will be available to receive the documents on March 27.