Ruto’s right-hand men speak out on the scale of graft

The president’s advisers have often said that Dr Ruto did not campaign on an anti-corruption model, but the financial haemorrhage is too fast to ignore

The morning of Thursday, September 21, was not easy for top government officials gathered at Kenya School of Government in Kabete for hours of dress down on a deep vice at key agencies in the Kenya Kwanza administration: corruption.

President William Ruto’s right-hand man in the civil service, Felix Koskei, was in a foul mood. In a meeting that brought together 35 Principal Secretaries, more than 200 chief executive officers of state corporations and their board chairs, heads of internal audit functions, and heads of major regulatory watchdogs, like the Auditor General and the Controller of budget, the Head of Public Service popularly known as HoPs was an angry man and he did not hide it.

His one-hour address painted a picture of rampant corruption in the regime where senior state officials have been plotting to steal, share the loot, and devise ways to stay longer in the offices where they can steal more while leaving critical public services in limbo and driving Kenya’s economy into turmoil. 

 “You can call it any name. Corruption has created a lot of economic sabotage, bringing down the economy; the government is reeling in debt. We are driving meaningless investment, stalled projects, dysfunctional infrastructure, and getting people in high positions who are illiterate because they forged their certificates and corrupted their ways,” a fuming Koskei told hundreds of senior government officials.

He said it is so widespread in the vice that it is essentially difficult to pinpoint corruption in the government because it had ‘permeated everywhere.’

The meeting, which was also meant to start an ambitious ‘zero audit fault ‘ regime for the financial year ending June 2024, kicked off a reward scheme to encourage civil servants to maintain clean records and eradicate corruption.

It emerged from the meeting that some government parastatal heads had formed the habit of procuring expensive flight tickets for trips within and outside the country and sending an elaborate advance team by road to destinations like Kisumu and Mombasa.

According to Treasury Principal Secretary Chris Kiptoo, who was among the key speakers at the event, the officials used laid-down procedures to procure travelling tickets but still ended up with a costly option. The top civil servants were also reprimanded for creating a poor working relationship due to the conflicting interests, especially between the board members and CEOs.

The government has reportedly issued instructions to all institutions involved in the fight against corruption from the inspector general of state corporation, the Ethics and Anti-corruption commission, the regulatory watchdog institutions, and parliament to muscle up for the impending duel with corruption.

So deep is the vice in government that even the Prime cabinet Secretary Musalia Mudavadi, the chief guest at the event, admitted to having been confronted by corruption while sitting in his new office.

His offices at the Kenya Railways headquarters are still being renovated, and it remains unclear whether he was referring to the tender linked to the renovation-related procurements.

Some parastatal chiefs, it merged, had refused to go on leave for fear of leaving any chance that may expose their corrupt practices. After the meeting, a circular had to be issued instructing those who had accumulated the leave days to proceed on leave immediately.

Some would go for more than a year if they were to redeem their forfeited leave days, a move Koskei said was suspicious, and that went against succession planning.

“Why should someone, for example, have 200 leave days not taken? Why, where is the problem? There are people here who, if you are told to leave now, you will be out for two years. Why are you sticking in that office? These are corruption indicators; what are you sticking around there for?” he posed.

According to Auditor General Nancy Gathungu, procurement-driven corruption is the most deeply rooted form of graft in the government. In the Financial year ending 30th June 2022, Sh5.8 billion was flagged by her office as unsupported expenditures. Ministries and Departments could not account for Sh3.2 billion while Sh2.58  of donor-funded projects remained unaccounted.

Corruption is also to blame for the ballooning pending bills that hit Sh504 billion while stalled projects that had sunk Sh77 billion and stagnated with up to Sh150 billion.