Sakaja: Ask State House comptroller about Sh16b in NMS pending bills

The State House comptroller should be the person to answer any questions on how the defunct Nairobi Metropolitan Service (NMS) accumulated Sh16 billion in pending bills, Nairobi Governor Johnson Sakaja has told senators.

Sakaja also made the dramatic claim that the money is owed to suppliers and contractors who are either MPs or close associates of lawmakers.

Yesterday, the Senate Finance Committee, chaired by Ali Roba (Mandera), heard that although NMS received Sh27 billion for the four functions it was overseeing, it still accumulated Sh16 billion in pending bills.

And now senators want a thorough audit of the bills and eligible ones be paid.

The committee gave Sakaja (pictured) fourteen days to provide a written report on the NMS pending bills and projects worth Sh15.4 billion.

Senators expressed concerns that NMS tenders were given only a small number of companies.

Senator Edwin Sifuna (Nairobi) described the tenders as potentially criminal, suggesting that 14 companies should be investigated for possibly siphoning money through dubious bills.

’We won’t pay’

Sakaja told the committee that the NMS was a national government agency and the accounting officer was the State House comptroller.

“The county government of Nairobi is not paying the pending bills …,” he said.

“We also don’t understand how NMS expended Sh40 billion for only four functions for the two and a half years it was in operation.”

Most contractors in waste management have not been paid, he said, adding that it could have led the service providers to stage a go-slow.

Sakaja’s comments on garbage collectors came after senators Roba, Sifuna, Boni Khalwale (Kakamega) and Tabitha Mutinda (nominated) pressed the governor to explain why there was uncollected trash across the city.

“Governor, why do we have heaps of garbage across the county? Is it that those handling waste management are on strike or they are in a go-slow because they have not been paid?” posed Sifuna.

Mutinda asked Sakaja to explain why most service providers had not been paid for work already done and for services rendered.

Stalled work

Sakaja responded by saying that several senators and MPs are doing business with the Nairobi county government and were pushing to be paid, adding that they should be asking the national government to pay them.

“The only best people to respond to the NMS concerns are the Office of the President. My administration has nothing to do with it. We found them in office and the accounting officer is the State House Comptroller,” Sakaja said.

Initiatives initiated by President Uhuru Kenyatta under NMS, including health centres, water, sewer lines and street lighting, have consumed billions.

Auditor General Nancy Gathungu in 2023 revealed that taxpayers may have lost Sh2.6 billion in advance payments to contractors for work that had since stalled.

The report, for instance, shows Sh1.6 billion had been paid out by NMS for projects across the city that are yet to be delivered.

These are the expansion of sewer lines and street lighting in Dandora, Kangemi, Kawangware, Dagoretti Corner, Waithaka, Riruta, Kibera, Korogocho, Mathare, Zimmerman, Thome, Githurai 45, Mwihoko, Kasarani and Mwiki.

NMS signed an agreement with the Health ministry to build 19 facilities.

At the time of the audit, work at four - in Sinai, Pumwani, Majengo, Lucky Summer and Gumba - was at 85 percent, 15 percent, 10 percent and five percent completed, respectively.

Gathungu cast doubt on whether the works were completed as there was no document provided on a contract extension or reasons for the slow work though the contractors.