EACC defends CoB against governors’ bombshells

 
The Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission has defended the Controller of Budget against attacks by the Council of Governors arising from her latest report which puts the county chiefs on the spot over development expenditure.
This follows an alarm raised by the Controller of Budget that some county governments are running multiple bank accounts with some of them running into hundreds.
The bank accounts, some of which were flagged, raised serious concerns about transparency and accountability in the management of devolved funds.
Speaking to Journalists in Mwingi, Kitui County on Friday, EACC, Spokesperson Eric Ngumbi criticized the Governors’ response to the audit findings.
Ngumbi urged governors to accept accountability and focus on addressing the irregularities pointed out by the Controller of Budget rather than dismissing oversight efforts.
“From where we sit as EACC, the Controller of Budget is right. She is discharging the mandate of that office under the constitution. Governors should take reform measures and address the gaps that CoB has raised. You cannot justify why a county government has to operate hundreds of bank accounts,” he said.
Ngumbi said that the maintenance of such a huge number of bank accounts raises eyebrows on the prudent use of public funds.
“As the EACC continues to discharge its mandate in the protection of public funds, the Commission urges the Honourable Governors to begin to recognize theft of public funds as an existential threat to devolution, and to individually and collectively implement accountability measures as routinely advised by oversight bodies,” Ngumbi said.
He urged the county bosses to implement various EACC Reports with key reform recommendations from the Corruption Risk Assessment undertaken in 28 counties so far.
CoG on Friday defended the counties following a damning report that found some of them to have spent zero of their allocation on development projects.
In a strongly worded statement, CoG chairperson Ahmed Abdullahi clarified that while this was true, it was worth noting that counties did not receive any funds from the Treasury during the first quarter of this financial year.
“As a matter of fact, counties received zero exchequer releases from the National Treasury during the quarter…,” the statement reads in part.
The report by Controller of Budget Margaret Nyakang’o released Wednesday covers the first quarter of this 2024-25 financial year, from July to September.
“The first disbursement was received during the last month of that quarter. However, no county was able to access the money by the end of that month,” said Abdullahi.
According to Abdullahi, counties said to have undertaken projects during the period utilised the balances they had from the previous year.
“…others took loans from commercial banks to pay salaries and sustain service delivery,” he said.
Pointing an accusing finger at the controller of budget for allegedly “scandalising” the counties, the Wajir Governor claimed the presentation has now portrayed the counties in bad light.
He said this has caused misleading impressions and unwarranted agitation among the public and media to the detriment of the governors.