Troubled NHIF lost Sh7 billion land in Nairobi, House committee told

The National Health Insurance Fund (NHIF) has lost a piece of land valued at over Sh7 billion to a rival enitity, a parliamentary committee heard yesterday.

MPs were also shocked to hear that the Fund awarded contracts for the construction of a car park even before it purchased land for the project.

The multi-storey car park project is also at the centre of an audit over the inflated cost of construction.

The Fund’s Chief Executive Officer Elijah Wachira told the National Assembly’s committee on Public Investments, Social Services, Administration and Agriculture that an entity which had been claiming the 10-acre piece of land in Karen, Nairobi has been paying for the land and rent rates to the Ministry of Lands and the county government.

Wachira said when his officers went to make payments at the offices, they found that one Peter Leparaku, a representative of the rival group, had made the payments.

He said Leparaku paid Sh514,330 and was duly issued with receipts even though the county government had received similar payments from the Fund for the piece of land.

“We reported the matter to the Karen Police Station and investigations are still on,” Wachira told the committee which is chaired by Navakholo MP Immanuel Wangwe.

Wachira (pictured) told the committee that no rate payments had been made for ten years before this year’s attempt.

“We learned when we assumed office that no payments had been made between 2013 to 2023,” he disclosed.

Last month, the committee visited the disputed Karen land which NHIF and two other entities lay claim.
The committee is currently investigating allegations of irregularities in loan issuance and cost inflation totaling billions of shillings at the Fund.

MPs were also shocked to learn that the State agency had not fenced the land despite a 2016 court order ordering it to do so.

The committee has invited the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) to shed light on the investigations of the ownership row.

The Fund management was pressed to clarify on Sh3.9 billion spent on consultants for the feasibility and design works of the car park.

“How come NHIF paid Sh3.9 billion for works that did not take off? NHIF management must explain this,” Wangwe stated.

The committee expressed concerns over the over 340 per cent increase in the cost of constructing a multi-storey car park in Nairobi and asked the management to provide supporting documents on the project.

Although records available indicate that the car park was completed in July 2008 at a total cost of Sh3,342,120,239, a further amount of Sh626,635,998 and Sh4,706,521 was incurred in 2009/2010 and 2010/2011 respectively on the car park increasing its total expenditure to Sh3,973,462,758 as at 30 June 2011, or resulting to an increase of approximately 337 percent over and above the original contract sum of Sh909,709,305.

“The management must explain this significant surge in construction costs. The contractors too must appear before the committee to make clarity on these charges,” demanded the committee vice chairman Caleb Amisi.