Crowd Storms Youth Enterprise Development Fund Offices

A group of youth on Tuesday afternoon stormed the Youth Enterprise Development Fund offices in Upper Hill demanding the removal of chairman Ronald Osumba.

The crowd asked him to vacate office immediately as money had been lost and as a result, young Kenyans were suffering.

They requested Osumba to step aside for investigations to commence and accused him of taking them in circles.

On his part, the embattled chair stated that he had not refused to step aside, further noting that accountability is paramount.

[caption caption="Ronald Osumba"][/caption]

"Accountability is paramount for public service. We welcomed them and had an open discussion on their concerns," he remarked.

In March this year, Osumba suspended seven senior officials at the state corporation on suspicion of fraud.

An audit report tabled on March 2 indicated that the seven may have had a hand in disbursing government loans irregularly.

Mr Osumba noted that the Board had agreed to suspend the officials to safeguard the use of public resources and avoid the further misappropriation of the funds.

The top officials suspended include the lending and investment manager and the senior accountant.

Mr Osumba also explained that the Board had noticed the irregularities after they commissioned a process of migrating the fund's data to an ERP system.

"The Board was notified on February 6 and consequently commissioned a special internal audit on the matter," he noted.

He added that the suspect officials may have taken advantage of the exercise to alter loan beneficiary details leading to the scandal.

[caption caption="Youth Enterprise Development Fund Chairperson Ronald Osumba"][/caption]

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