The Kenyan Senate on Tuesday, April 23, summoned Nandi County Governor Stephen Sang to issue a clarification over unexplained expenditure totalling over Ksh1 billion.
Sang was summoned by the County Public Accounts Committee (CPAC) chaired by Homa Bay Senator Moses Kajwang.
The amounts are believed to have been misappropriated between 2021 and 2022.
Speaking after the meeting, Senator Kajwang remarked that governors will eventually have to take responsibility for failing to account for public funds.
What prompted the CPAC to term Nandi County as a criminal enterprise was reports that a local dairy project ended up consuming unexplained Ksh538 million.
The project was initially expected to cost USD1 million but the figure later ballooned to USD5 million with no clear explanation provided.
Another case of mismanagement was a hospital which was expected to be upgraded at a cost of Ksh370 million only to end up costing the taxpayer Ksh500 million.
The senate was briefed that even after an extra Ksh130 million was pumped into the project, the hospital upgrade remained incomplete.
Additionally, Sang within the same period of time used Ksh100 million for the governor’s office which has since stalled.
“On bank balances, Ksh295 million cannot be accounted for,” Kajwang remarked on the state of Nandi County.
The suspected mismanagement of funds was highlighted by reports published by the Auditor General breaking down spending of public funds in the Financial Years 2020/2021 and 2021/2022.
Senate is mandated by the law to summon governors to account for how taxpayers' money is spent by devolved units.
