Scholarships row revives Buzeki, Mandago rivalry

The row surrounding the Uasin Gishu county scholarship saga which has seen students stranded after their parents paid out more than Sh900 million to send them to universities abroad has opened a new political battle between Senator Jackson Mandago and his political rival Zedekiah Bundotich alias Buzeki.

Mandago, a former governor, has come under fire after the Uasin Gishu County Assembly ad-hoc committee, which investigated the scholarship scam, found out that three senior officers under his administration were responsible for the mess. The three were signatories of the fund that collected hundreds of millions of shillings which they used to enrich themselves.

Buzeki, who unsuccessfully vied for the Uasin Gishu gubernatorial seat in 2022, yesterday dared Mandago to shed light on what he knows about the saga and stop shifting goal posts.

Mandago was the founder of the Uasin Gishu County Overseas Programme Trust Fund, which claimed it could take Kenyan students to study in Finland and Canada but failed to do so.

“When you mention Finland, one name is synonymous, that is Mandago, but in his usual characteristic, he has started looking for an escape route,” said Buzeki.

He laughed off remarks by Mandago that the agents who connected students from Uasin Gishu to Finnish and Canadian universities did a good job.

“Mandago please don’t take the people of Uasin Gishu on a wild goose chase. The sooner you admit liability, the sooner you save face, the better for the people of Uasin Gishu County. It is sad that many parents who are in agony now are the people who voted for you,” said Buzeki.

He warned Governor Jonathan Bii, who succeeded Mandago, to be cautious noting that he risks being left to carry the scholarship row cross alone.

Mandago has defended himself from the accusations arguing that he meant well for the children from Uasin Gishu wishing to further their studies abroad when he came up with the programme.

“I could not have started this programme with bad intentions. I started it because I believed it was going to transform lives,” said Mandago during a forum with the affected students and parents on Tuesday.

Disrupt  conference

According to Mandago, when he handed over the programme to Governor Jonathan Bii’s administration, there was more than Sh104 million in bank accounts under the overseas education trust.

This has, however, contradicted Bii’s position who has maintained that the account only had Sh1.8 million, with a deficit of Sh84 million when he took over.

Bii’s administration has since announced that it has no money to refund the affected parents claiming they found a mere Sh1.8 million in the scholarship account.

Parents and students who failed to travel have threatened to disrupt the devolution conference slated for next week in Eldoret if they are not refunded their money.

According to Deputy Governor John Barorot, the devolved unit is in the process of engaging the universities for a possible refund but added that the process will take time.

Among others, the Assembly ad-hoc committee recommended that the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) and the Directorate of Criminal Investigation (DCI) conduct a probe into forgery, abuse of office and integrity of county officers who served under Mandago’s administration.

EACC has since commenced investigations into alleged embezzlement of more than Sh837 million by officials of the Uasin Gishu County Government.

The funds were collected from parents for the facilitation of Tertiary Education in Finland and Canada during the Financial Year 2021/2022.

 Mandago was last week interrogated by EACC for more than nine hours at Integrity Centre in Nairobi.

 Sources indicate that Mandago was summoned to assist in investigations considering his role as the Chief Executive Officer of the County Government of Uasin Gishu when the Overseas Trust Fund was conceptualized and operationalized.

 The Uasin Gishu Education Trust Fund Account was opened in May 2021 and by December 2022 a total of Sh957,167,143 had been credited to the account by parents.