It was not only shocking, but also painful. A National Government budget being used by the County Government! Well, Kiambu Governor Ferdinand Waititu has come under fire for a Sh2.5 billion expenditure that caused the Senate order a special audit, but he is now pointing blame fingers at his predecessor.
The governor was on Thursday hard-pressed to explain the expenditure in 2017-18 financial year.
Among the queried expenses are Sh902 million spent on coordination of State House Functions. The vote had been allocated Sh973.9 million during the year.
According to the County’s financial statements presented to the Senate by Waitutu’s government, Kiambu spent all the Sh180.5 million set aside for administration of statutory benefits for retired presidents.
State Corporations Advisory Services gobbled up Sh591.6 million set aside in the county’s 2017-18 financial year for the budget line.
The Kiambu government also spent some Sh793 million on Free Primary Education. The vote, despite being a National Government function had been allocated a whooping Sh804 million during the year.
Kiambu spent Sh58 million on Kenya-South Sudan Advisory Services.
The allocations and expenditures were flagged out by the Senate County Public Accounts and Investments Committee chairman Moses Kajwang.
The governor said he was unaware of the allocations and insinuated that the allocation could have been ‘sneaked’ into the bulky documents.
However, while appearing in an interview on KTN News on Thursday night, Waititu disowned the budget, arguing that it was prepared by the former Governor William Kabogo.
He argued that they were elected in August 2017 and started using the budget in November 2017.
“We were elected in August 2017. We started using this budget in November 2017. It is not us who did this budget, it was for the previous government by governor Kabogo,” he said.
Do you think the budget in question was prepared by the previous government that was headed by Hon William Kabogo as Governor Waititu alleges?