As the curtains fall on another year, financial scandals and misuse of public resources were never far off.
State institutions, county governments, ministries and corporate institutions among others made headlines after some of them were implicated in corruption allegations and embezzlement of public funds.
Senior Government officials including Treasury Cabinet Secretary Henry Rotich, his Permanent Secretary Kamau Thugge, Governors Mike Sonko (Nairobi), Moses Lenolkulal (Samburu) and Ferdinand Waititu (Kiambu) were forced to stay out of office after they were charged with graft related cases.
Arror and Kimwarer dams scandal
In July, suspended CS Rotich and his PS, Thugge were charged in connection with the multi-billion-shilling Kimwarer and Arror dams’ scandal.
They were accused of flouting procurement procedures in awarding a contract worth more than Ksh45 billion for the construction of the two dams to an Italian firm – CMC de Ravenna.
The two, however, denied the charges and were released on Ksh15 million cash bail.
However, they were barred from office prompting President Uhuru to appoint labour CS Ukurr Yattani as the acting Treasury acting CS and Julius Muia as the acting PS.
Itare Dam
Rift Valley Water Service Board landed in trouble after they were summoned by the anti-graft officer over the stalled Sh30 billion Itare Dam project.
The board together with Water CS Samson Chelugui were questioned over the matter but denied any wrongdoing.
Kenya Power overbilling
Director of Criminal Investigations George Kinoti revealed that cartels working in Kenya Power stole Sh150 billion from unsuspecting customers in five years.
The racketeers, including members of staff, brokers and companies, are said to have “perfected” a system where they had been overbilling customers, with domestic customers getting monthly bills as high as Sh300,000.
NHIF pay scandal
Early this year, it was reported that the National Hospital Insurance Fund (NHIF) could have lost more than Sh10 billion in false medical claims.
The Sh10 billion, flagged as fraudulent, was part of about Sh50 billion paid to NHIF by Treasury as capitation premiums for medical cover for civil servants, Kenya Police Service, National Youth Service and Kenya Prisons Service since 2013.