Postal chief on the spot over deal on cash transfer

The head of the Postal Corporation of Kenya has been asked to give reason why he should not be fired for alleged mismanagement at the State corporation, the Nation has learnt.

A three-man committee convened to come up with recommendations after a forensic audit of the corporation’s activities since the inception of its money transfer service, PostaPay, decided to ask Post Master General Fred Odhiambo to explain why he should not be sacked.

Information Permanent Secretary, Bitange Ndemo, said on Tuesday the committee had also sanctioned compulsory leave for seven top managers to allow auditors access information.

The revelations came as Mr Odhiambo said one of the suspended senior managers at Posta had been linked to the firm that handles the organisation’s money transfer system.

Mr Odhiambo said a report of a forensic audit presented to the management last week had established a conflict of interest between a top manager and Afripayments, the firm that manages PostaPay.

The audit report had also raised concerns about the manner in which Afripayments was contracted to run PostaPay system.

Mr Odhiambo, a marketer by profession, said PCK may have to withdraw from the eight-year deal with Afripayments ‘if concerns over allegations of conflict of interest are verified.’

“The contract we have with them can be terminated on arbitration or non-performance so we can withdraw if the allegations are proved,” said Mr Odhiambo.

Allegations

Posta Pay would then have to depend on its own system, which Mr Odhiambo said would stop their international transactions, restricting them to local operations only.

The seven suspended managers, except Andrew Tanui (Finance) were in charge of the Posta Pay project, launched by PCK in 2006 and have since become general managers.

They are Ken Oluoch (Facilities and Logistics), Sally Wainaina (Financial Services), Enock Kihara (Mail), Tom Ogutu (IT), Julius Shigoli (Company Secretary), Chris Isabwa (Procurement Manager) and Mr Tanui

Mr Tanui’s office was broken into last weekend and security guards are being quizzed to identify the burglar and what he carried away.

They were sent on compulsory leave last week and are expected to verify the results of the forensic audit ordered by Dr Ndemo in August last year.

According to Mr Odhiambo, Posta Pay has made Sh259 million out of a total revenue of Sh445 million in the 27 months since it started operating and termed it as “highly profitable.”

Separately, the Kenya Anti-Corruption Commission has summoned three of the suspended managers to appear at the headquarters from 9 a.m on Wednesday.

The rest are to be grilled by the anti-graft detectives within the week.