Githu: I don’t owe auditor an answer

All expenditures by the State Law Office were cleared by the auditor-general, Attorney-General Githu Muigai said on Wednesday.

Defending his office against audit queries, Prof Githu said the auditor-general issued a clearance certificate approving the expenditures.

He accused the audit office of maliciously including resolved issues at the State Law Office among its audit queries.

“I want it to be clear first that as the attorney-general I am not an accounting officer, but again, the amounts mentioned are far beyond our own budget,” he said.

“I have a certificate for the year ended 30th June 2014 clearing this office from any form of audit queries in the year under review.”

Health Cabinet Secretary James Macharia weighed in, saying the report on his ministry was not credible.

The auditor singled out the ministry as having incurred the largest amount in unsupported expenditure.

Mr Macharia said the matter had been misunderstood.

Foreign Affairs Principal Secretary Karanja Kibicho said the ministry appeared on the list of State organs that could not account for funds because of an old court case.

“The auditor-general ought to up his game,” he said. He accused the auditor-general of taking a “populist path instead of being professional”.

“He failed to discuss the Tokyo angle which has nothing to do with the financial year in question.”

He was responding to a query involving Sh1.4 billion on his portfolio.

Industrialisation PS Wilson Songa, whose ministry’s Sh300 million expenditure is among those questioned, dismissed the audit report as “strange and shocking.”