President Uhuru Kenyatta on Tuesday chaired a Cabinet meeting which approved the restructuring of the NYS to deal with the managerial and operational challenges that threaten to cripple the organisation.
The head of state has urged the newly appointed Principal Secretary to the Ministry of Youth and Gender Affairs Dr Francis Owino to oversee the streamlining of the National Youth Service. Rocked by two mega scandals, the youth ministry is getting a new man who will be charged with turning its fortunes, especially in matters of finance management.
Speaking in State House where Owino was sworn into office, the Head of State reminded him to remedy the financial leakages that have seen the ministry lose billions of funds in dubious transactions. “We expect the highest degree of integrity and loyalty to the people,” Kenyatta said, while addressing Owino.
In the same event was Esther Koimett who was sworn in as the new Principal Secretary in the Ministry of Transport.
The event came just after a Cabinet meeting that President Kenyatta chaired, whose agenda was solely based on restructuring the NYS docket. A statement posted on President Kenyatta’s twitter page indicates that the meeting recommended restructuring of the NYS to solve the operational problems that have led to financial losses.
Such would involve clean-up of the organization’s supply chain management functions as well as re-examining the budgetary and internal audit processes.
Besides changing the NYS to a body corporate, the Cabinet also approved the proposed a clean-up of the supply chain management function as well as budgetary and internal audit reforms among other measures. The Cabinet also approved the revival of the Kenya National Shipping Line “which will involve giving the company the sole mandate to handle.
The National Youth Service (NYS) is an organisation under the Government of Kenya. It was established in 1964 to train young people in important national matters. Before the late 1980’s, students had to participate in the organisation before admission into universities. Today, recruitment is done on a volunteer basis.
Volunteers acquire basic paramilitary skills and have an option to continue further technical training or join the Kenya Defence Forces. In 2013, the government of President Uhuru Kenyatta began restructuring of the organisation to solve the high youth unemployment in Kenya. The rebranded NYS was launched in September 2014. It allowed for recruitment of community cohorts, who did not have to attend the paramilitary training to be involved with the works of the organisation.
In 2015 was at the centre stage of a scandal that had rocked the Ministry of Devolution and Planning. This led to the then Cabinet Secretary of the ministry, Anne Waiguru, and the director general, Nelson Githinji, of the NYS to resign.Richard Ethan Ndubai was sworn in as the new director general on January 2016.