Magoha rebuffs auditor’s claim of ministry’s fiscal impropriety

Education Cabinet Secretary George Magoha yesterday discounted claims by Auditor-General Nancy Gathungu that his ministry failed to adhere to financial management regulations.

Prof Magoha said the ministry gave a satisfactory response in Parliament over their spending and that not a single cent has been lost.

“This ministry under my care has had one target, to ensure that there is value for money, which is what has been lacking in the past. The good thing is that most of the things we have done are measurable and will remain even when we are not there,” Magoha said when commissioning two Competency-Based Curriculum (CBC) classrooms at Limuru Girls’ High School.

Magoha stated that his team was invited to parliament where its officials candidly explained itself on the matter. He challenged those in doubt to confirm through the Hansard.

 Magoha attributed the claims of alleged flouting of financial management regulations to deep-rooted corruption cartels in the ministry.

 “The cartels are at the centre of my ministry. We found them there and we shall leave them there,” he added.

 He was responding to an audit report where the Ministry has been put on the spot on how Sh85 billion in the 2020/21 Financial Year was spent.

 “There is one problem in Kenya today; those who work diligently are the ones who end up being demonised. I am being fought by cartels after I sealed all corruption loopholes in the ministry,” he regretted.

 The visibly irate minister  said he will be accountable for his action during his tenure in the ministry and will hide nothing if called upon to explain.

Work on timelines

 Already, he has warned contractors doing construction works in schools to keep to the timelines provided.

 Magoha has made specific reference to contractors on Secondary Quality Improvement Project (SEQIP) classrooms saying they are dragging the process.

 “I want to warn for purposes of those doing  SEQIP classrooms that I have seen the typical nonchalant attitude of our contractors. First of all, we are only spending Sh788,000 for CBC classrooms and they are talking about three and a half weeks to complete. SEQIP ones are costing Sh1.26 million and started earlier than the second phase and up to now, they are yet to complete one. So those busy bodies who keep saying that they have officers in the field, we are Kenyans and should be honest with ourselves,” Magoha said.

Government money

 He told the contractors handling SEQIP classrooms that this time round they will not steal any government money.

 “They can delay as much as they can but for the next four to five weeks that we shall still be there, we are going to refocus and ensure that they deliver those classrooms because we need those classrooms,” warned Magoha.

 Magoha said there is a risk of money getting lost during transition to the next administration if the contractors do not deliver in good time, which must be avoided at all cost.

 “What otherwise would happen because there is a transition, the money will disappear and there will be no classrooms but like I have said before, that will not happen under my watch. As I hand over, there will be a detailed report of the SEQIP classrooms and the time taken,” he said.

 “I hope that the person who takes over is able to follow you and take you to jail so that if I am there we are there with you. I will be there for going out to check whether they have completed and you will be there for stealing Government money, how nice does it feel to ensure we do what we have to do,” he added.

 Gathungu recently raised questions about the accuracy of the ministry’s data claiming that her office was denied access to the National Education Management Information Systems (NEMIS).

 In her report, Gathungu says that failure to access the NEMIS data made it impossible for auditors to validate and verify expenditure to billions of shillings.

 The CS, however, said that the ministry has plans to safeguard NEMIS in order to ward off corrupt busy bodies who might hack them.