MPs query Sh302m meant for media job

The Parliamentary Accounts Committee (PAC) on Wednesday questioned a Sh302 million contract to media personality Angela Angwenyi by the Ministry of Devolution for a year-long publicity campaign.

The team, led by Rarieda MP Nicholas Gumbo put Ms Angwenyi to task to explain her qualifications for the deal, saying the ministry allowed her to quote an outrageous figure that was not backed by delivery.

Ms Angwenyi’s Out of the Box Solutions landed the State Department of Planning-run job to publicise Access to Government Procurement Opportunities (AGPO) tenders by women, youth and persons with disabilities on May 12, 2015.

Ms Angwenyi has since been paid Sh90 million, or 30 per cent of the deal. Her firm, she said, had delivered 60 per cent of the task before it was stopped by the ministry in January.

The MPs questioned the contract, the first payout and the fact that Ms Angwenyi had not demanded payment.

BLANK CHEQUE

“The way this contract is framed, you will have a lot of difficulty proving to anyone that this was not just a blank cheque,” said Mr Gumbo.

Kieni MP Kanini Kega said: “I have not seen those adverts that you are saying played for this campaign. This Sh30 million was just a blank cheque.”
Mwatate MP Andrew Mwadime asked: “I have not seen these things in my constituency; did you go there?”

Ms Angwenyi, however, said her company, which she said was registered in 2010, had the capacity to deliver on the contract. She said it placed its bid for the job following an advertisement in the Standard newspaper in October 2014, was shortlisted and eventually awarded the contract.

She said her firm executed 11 radio commercials, ran adverts on Citizen TV, prepared promotional caps, T-shirts, bags, billboards and fliers and revamped the AGPO website.

Ms Angwenyi was accompanied by the company’s chief of operations Anthony Lungaho and her lawyer Ken Odera.