Graft: Ethics team turns the heat on most counties

Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission Chairperson Mumo Matemu. FILE PHOTO |

What you need to know:

  • Spokesman Yasin Amaro told the Nation the investigations “are at an advanced stage” but declined to divulge details or the counties.

Most counties are under investigation for misuse of money allocated to them in the ending financial year.

Wednesday, the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission said it was investigating nearly 35 counties after it received complaints over the allocation of funds, recruitment and tendering.

Spokesman Yasin Amaro told the Nation the investigations “are at an advanced stage” but declined to divulge details or the counties.

“The whole thing will zero in to the accounting officers. There will be others who, maybe, did not do their jobs right. But we are first investigating the people directly charged with the responsibilities given to them in the counties,” he said.

“Most of investigations are on procurement, recruitment, unequal representation of those who did not fulfil the Constitutional requirement of 30 per cent. We are looking at almost three quarters of the counties.”

Other sources said that five of the counties are in Nyanza, six in the Rift Valley and western, three in central and northern Kenya and one at the Coast.

This financial year, county governments were allocated Sh210 billion. In January this year, the Controller of Budget indicated that 27 counties were not allocated a cent for development between July and October.