Unqualified and idle staff blamed for high wage bill

A new government audit report has unearthed massive irregularities in the human resource departments in different counties with several employees holding offices illegally and others getting salaries without working.

The report also reveals that some employees in many counties lack important documents such as their first appointment letters, promotion letters, academic and professional certificates to reflect their current status and the salary they were earning.

IDLE STAFF

Others just idle in their offices as their duties are not stated.

The report, prepared by the Transition Authority, also highlights the distribution of workers in counties in terms of age, education, ethnicity and gender. It also revealed the existence of ghost workers.

In Kwale for instance, 1,227 officers were in the payroll but a headcount revealed that only 931 officers could be identified.

According to the report, there are a total of 102,653 workers in all counties. Of the total number, officers from the devolved ministries account for 70 per cent of the workforce while the rest are drawn from the defunct local authorities.

There are 10 counties with less than 1,000 workers and this was attributed to their location. Among them are Kilifi, Tana River, Lamu, Wajir, Mandera, Marsabit, Isiolo, Turkana, West Pokot and Samburu which are all in hardship areas.

Only 18 counties have a staff of 2,000 and above.

The report recommends that staff serving in critical roles should be redeployed immediately to other functions.

It was also found out that hundreds of staff were drawing their salaries from other counties despite serving in a different jurisdiction.

“There should be an immediate formalisation of transfer of payroll for such officers.”

Nairobi County has the largest number of staff, a total of 13,580 officers.

REDEPLOYMENT

The county has also the highest number of workers from defunct local authorities. In terms of devolved functions, Nakuru has the most staff at 3,349 officers while Mandera has the least with only 420 officers.

Nakuru county has a total workforce of 5,008 while Mombasa has a workforce of 3,886 officers.

The county human resource audit report reveals unequal distribution of workers in the 47 counties.

TA has recommended that massive staff distribution be done throughout the 47 counties to avoid scenarios where one county has bloated staff while the other is understaffed.

“Staff at support level to be redistributed evenly to ease congestion in some departments and also reduce idle capacity since there are surplus staff in some counties while others have acute shortage,” says the yet to be released report.

TA also faulted some counties for continuing to hire more staff even after recruitment was frozen.

Tuesday, council of governors chairman Isaac Rutto said counties were addressing the skills-gap and that all of them were now hiring professionals.

“What is in the report does not reflect the current position in all counties now.

“We have employed professionals and are now ensuring equity in job distribution,” Mr Rutto said.

He gave the example of his Bomet county, where there are more than 100 degree holders among the employees working under the Health ministry with hundreds others in other departments.

“The Public Service Board is undertaking staff rationalisation which is expected to come to an end in June,” Mr Rutto said.

Salaries for hundreds of staff who failed to turn up for the auditing should be stopped, the report recommends.

From the report, most officers are aged above 50 meaning their retirement is around the corner.

The report thus recommends that elaborate succession management plan be put in place in preparation for a smooth exit from the service to block any gaps that would be created once officers retire or opt to quit.