Embakasi East Member of Parliament Babu Owino has shed light on the meticulous process the Auditor General employs to track down the misuse of bursary funds.
Babu emphasised the critical role that constituents play in ensuring transparency and accountability of the money allocated for the education of their children.
Addressing his constituents, Owino highlighted recent challenges faced during the distribution of bursary cheques.
"The last time I gave you guys cheques, we encountered some challenges. Some people failed to submit the acknowledgement receipts," he stated.
"When you take it to a school, you are given an acknowledgement receipt to show that the school has received the bursary. That receipt is not yours; you are expected to take that receipt to the CDF office, but most of you still have them in your houses."
The vocal ODM MP explained that these receipts are crucial for the auditing process.
"When the Auditor General sends his people to the office to audit the fund, those are the receipts they look at to ascertain whether the bursary fund was allocated to the constituents or not," he said.
"If they find that the receipts are not enough, they might think that the bursary was not given to the people."
To avoid such misunderstandings, the legislator urged constituents to return all acknowledgement receipts to the CDF office.
"If you bring all those receipts, the Auditor General will ascertain that indeed the fund was distributed," he assured.
He asked parents and guardians in the constituency to shorten the auditing process by delivering the acknowledgement receipts in good time.
"I have the list of all of you, phone numbers, and schools of everyone who received the fund. The Auditor General can use that, and if they find that there are problems, they will call you and the school to confirm whether you received the money. That is very transparent, but that is a long route. The shortest one is if you bring back the receipts to the CDF office so that I can make them available during the audit," he explained.
In some sort of civic education, the Embakasi East MP asked residents to fill the bursary application forms completely and accurately to enable the correct distribution of the fund.
"When you are given a form to fill out but do not write the admission number of your children, I write you cheques because I have the name of the school," he said. "If the Auditor General comes and finds that information missing, she will suspect something," he stated.
The MP's remarks underscore the importance of proper documentation and compliance with procedures to ensure the integrity of bursary fund distribution. "When you are given that form, fill it in its entirety to allow smooth operations," Owino urged his constituents.
Lately, the National Government Constituency Development Fund (NG-CDF) has come under sharp scrutiny with Senators calling for its abolishment.
MPs have stood firm against the proposal, explaining that scrapping the fund will cripple development and education at the constituency level.
