The National Social Security Fund (NSSF) on Wednesday, April 12, revealed that it was unable to sell or rent out houses located near State House, Nairobi.
NSSF made the revelation when it appeared before National Assembly’s Public Investments Committee to answer audit questions for the financial year 2019/2020.
The committee which was led by Navakholo Member of Parliament (MP) Emanuel Wangwe faulted the NSSF for overpricing the units.
Acting Managing Trustee of NSSF, David Mwangangi, the Acting Finance Manager, Merita Mutinda and the Acting General Manager in charge of properties Moses Cheseto explained to the parliament that they had 104 units near State House that were yet to be sold or rented out.
They told the Wangwe-led team that they were selling the units which consisted of 3-bedroom houses at Ksh35 million per unit but no buyers or tenants were forthcoming.
The MPs felt that the houses were being sold at exorbitant prices leading to many Kenyans shunning them and in the process the government was incurring losses for the project that cost taxpayer’s money in 2016.
While overpricing the Nairobi-based units, the NSSF was in the same breath accused of undervaluing assets in Mombasa.
It was exposed that NSSF bought Hazina Plaza in Mombasa in 1994 at a cost of Ksh450 million and was now looking to sell it at Ksh380 million.
In a further trail of mismanagement of public funds, it was exposed that NSSF had uncollected rent amounting to Ksh30 million.
This was for rental houses at Bruce House, Hazina Trade Centre, Nyayo Estate and Viewpark Towers.
Members of Parliament wondered whether this was a collusion between some staff at NSSF and tenants to defraud the system.
“Just because we wrote off the money from defaulted rent it does not mean we will not try to recover it,” Mutinda defended NSSF.
"The NSSF of yester years is not the NSSF of today. we have enhanced governance. Today we have a regulator who is the Retirement Benefits Authority (RBA) to keep us in check. We can thus assure Kenyans that their money is safe,” Mwangangi added.
