Officials give committee wide berth
By Alvin.Mwangi, January 10, 2024Officials expected to appear before an Ad hoc committee investigating the decline of revenue collection at the Nairobi County Government gave it a wide berth.
They included Kenya Revenue Authority officers, Executive officials, Benson Njoroge, and officers from State Departments of ICT and Digital Economy and Internal Security and National Administration in charge of Nairobi Revenue System.
In a letter to Assembly clerk, the revenue collector requested that they be allowed to appear before the committee on January 22, nine days before the committee tables its report before the Assembly.
On their part, the county Executive team said they would attend the meeting if it is scheduled later with the acting clerk reporting to the committee that they decided not to attend after seeing a letter by KRA that they would not attend.
According to the clerk, witnesses tend to choose when to honour summons hence the committee remains the one to determine when they should appear.
“Witnesses tend to buy time and choose when to appear before the committee. But according to the parliamentary orders, this committee is not bound to the said date of January 22, hence they are allowed to determine when they should appear,” she advised.
Committee agreed to send letters to witnesses to appear before them on January 17.
Committee chair, also the Majority Leader and Makongeni MCA Peter Imwatok (pictured) raised queries on how the County Secretary knew contents of the KRA letter, saying if they have no contract then the content was confidential and only addressed to clerk.
“It is surprising that KRA wrote a letter and the first person to write concurring with them is the county secretary. I thought the letter was addressed to us (Assembly clerk). At what point was it shared with the county government if they do not share any contract so far?” Imwatok questioned. Committee is expected to explain status of the investigations.